Work Text:
Hayden has known Boston Lily for going on… four years? Maybe five? It was hard to tell exactly the first time he noticed that there was one notification that Shane would never ignore. But either way, it had been a long time he had known her. Or, not known her, but known of her. Sure they had never met, and he had never seen so much as a picture of her, but he knew plenty about her. Hayden knew she lived in Boston. He knew she walked Shane like a dog. He knew Shane would snatch his phone out of sight the second his screen lit up with a notification. And he knew that whatever was going on with those two was either true love or the messiest situationship in human history.
Really, Hayden isn’t sure what he thought was going on there to cause such secrecy. Outside of her being super famous, which Hayden found unlikely due to Shane’s similar popularity and the Rose Landry skirmish, or perhaps her being married and this being an affair situation, which he discounted on account of Shane’s moral compass, he couldn’t think of a reason for the hush-hush of it all. Shane was private, but not so private to hide a whole girlfriend for multiple years from his best buddy. At first he thought Lily was simply a longterm hookup, he knew many of his teammates had a girl in every city (something he had thankfully never had to deal with since he had Jackie at home,) but then she definitely became something…more. Shane would start to bring her up in conversations. A simple remark that ‘Lily hates that kind of vodka,’ or ‘Lily loves that movie.’ Not the kind of things you’d remember about your on-again off-again FWB in a different country.
But Hayden wasn’t one to pry, and if Shane wasn’t ready to talk about Lily then he wasn’t ready to talk about Lily. That was that. But then, Shane made a rookie mistake. He had asked Jackie what kind of hair products might be good for a girl with curly hair. Jackie’s radar for gossip had gone off instantly, and the next thing Hayden knew he was being shook down for details- and reprimanded for not telling Jackie earlier-about the illusive Boston Lily. It wasn’t until he was dishing to Jackie that Hayden realized how little he really knew about her, and how strange it was that Shane was still hiding what had evidently turned into a very serious relationship.
So that led Hayden to receiving his post-season marching orders from Jackie: retrieve Boston Lily’s phone number so she might be added to the metros WAG group chat. Any girl dating a superstar athlete needed a support group, according to Jackie, and she was especially worried that Boston Lily had been left to navigate things on her own for so long. Hayden could admit that on top of getting this girl the support she (allegedly) needed, he was curious to figure out what about her required such secrecy.
The only problem with this task? Way easier said than done. Shane Hollander was kind of a brick wall when it came to his secrets. It was no use trying to shake the guy down, he kept his cards close to his chest. Hayden had already inquired about Lily several times over the last few years only to be shrugged off, have the subject changed, or be simply told that ‘it was complicated.’ Hayden didn’t know how much more direct he needed to get that Shane needed to stop isolating his maybe-girlfriend and have a face-the-music awakening about whatever was going on with their relationship. He did give it the old college try a few more times on Jackie’s request, but Shane was becoming an expert on changing the subject these days. By the time they’re a week out from the season’s end, Hayden is about to admit to Jackie that it might be a lost cause. They’d have better luck putting out flyers in Boston appealing to Lily to join the damn WAG chat herself, but Hayden didn’t want a bunch of Boston creeps to potentially have access to Jackie’s phone number. But then, nearly miraculously, Shane takes a third shot when they’re all out drinking. A third shot!
Third-shot Shane was an illusive creature. A thing of myth and legend to most of the voyagers, honestly. During the season they’d be hard-pressed to get Shane to have much more than a beer, and even when celebrating a big victory he normally limited himself to only one or two shots of hard liquor. It didn’t matter how beefy the Montreal captain was, his historic abstaining from drinking meant that he was a damn lightweight. One shot was enough to pinken his cheeks, two shots was enough to get him buzzed, and three shots was deeply into the ‘tipsy’ category. Four shots was an even rarer, more cataclysmic event, but even three was enough to have Shane laughing louder than normal and staring dazedly off into space. But, most important for Hayden's purposes, it had him on his phone texting Lily.
The bar they were at tonight was a nice one close to Hayden’s house. It had shiny lacquered wood floors and maroon vinyl barstools that were illuminated by novelty hubcap light fixtures that shone down in multicolored light. They were there with JJ and a few of the others, not doing much other than dicking around, but Shane had miraculously joined in for the third group shot. Nothing more than a pleasant buzz to Hayden, his rookie days had given him a liver of steel, but shockingly indulgent for Shane. So Hayden watched, one barstool over, as Shane hunched over the bar on his phone. He was dead to everything but his phone screen as he tapped out a message to someone that, in his heart of hearts, Hayden knew was Boston Lily.
Hayden tries, once more, for the direct route. Unethical as it might have been for him to exploit Shane in his tipsyness, he was starting to realize there were few other paths to success.
“Are you talking to her again, man-?”
“I have to go to the bathroom,” Shane says quickly, standing up from his barstool and nearly knocking over his empty shot glass in his haste. His question-dodging is so blatant Hayden just has to sigh, frowning as Shane pointedly didn’t look at him on his way to the maroon curtains that hid the bar’s tiny bathroom. He was so damn eager to escape the conversation he even left his keys and phone on the table.
His open phone.
Hayden stares at the phone. It’s sitting temptingly on the dark wood bar. Just open, for the entire world to see. Shane had never done that before. So now Hayden was left to stare at the open message screen. The last few people texted are the usual suspects, his mother, Hayden himself, and then, damningly, at the top of the list, Boston Lily. A little speech bubble in her box proving they were clearly in the middle of a conversation.
Looking back at the corner of the bar, Hayden doesn’t see anything but the closed curtain. Shane had barely been gone for ten seconds, but it felt like a lifetime that the phone had been left open on the bar. Like some kind of test. But Shane was far too tipsy to do some elaborate test of Hayden’s respect for his privacy. And he was far too tipsy to notice if his phone wasn’t exactly in the same position it was when he left it. Hayden didn’t even need to ask Shane for Lily’s number if he could just… just quickly grab it himself. Sure, that was a little underhanded, but it would all be for the best.
Before he can chicken out, Hayden grabs Shane’s phone off of the bar. Its screen is immaculately clean, no smudged child-fingerprints like Hayden’s phone had from too many little kids asking to play one of the mobile games he kept installed for them. Hayden’s finger trembles as he holds the black-cased phone in one hand, clicking into Lily’s message thread.
Before Hayden can click the little I in the corner that would take him to her information, he’s distracted by the last texts Shane had sent.
Me: I need yous o so bad right now.
Me: It’s been to long.
Me: I miss you,,.
Shockingly sweet. It reminds Hayden of the way he would start to sound after too much time on the road away from Jackie. It almost makes him feel guilty for intruding on a private moment. But he perseveres, ignoring the bubbling incoming text from Lily. He clicks into the information tab and quickly tries to memorize the information. 617-882-4044. 617-882-4044. Hayden repeats it one more time in his mind. 617-882-4044.
Certain he’ll remember it, he clicks out of the information tab to try. On his way out, he sees the text from Lily finally upload with a merry chime.
Lily: {Image Upload}
And then Hayden is staring at a penis. A very large penis.
“Huh?”
Any numbers are immediately banished from Hayden’s mind. It is replaced by the absolutely filthy dick pic that Lily has just sent to Shane. Hayden has to blink several times to make sure he’s seeing this right. Sure enough, it’s a dick pic. Taken in low light at an upward angle, as tastefully as Hayden imagined a dick pic might be able to look, this was clearly not a first-time thing. Lily was clearly very used to taking pictures of her penis and sending them to Shane. There isn’t much more in the picture but the background of a white comforter and the edge of a tan thigh.
Lily: I miss you too ;).
Hayden finally gasps, snapped back to reality. He turns the phone off and hurriedly puts it back on the counter, trying very hard to look normal as Shane emerges from the bathroom and wanders back over to the bar. Hayden can only watch in muted shock as Shane opened his phone to the message with Lily, his face going red as he hurriedly closed the phone again and put it face-down on the bar. Not uncommon, then. Hayden remembers distantly all the other times Shane had done that over the years.
“I’m gonna go home,” Shane says, nearly a mumble. His face is still bright red when he slips his phone into his pocket.
“Yep. Yeah. See you, man,” Hayden says, hoping his facial expression is any kind of normal.
Shane doesn’t seem to mind in any case. He leaves with barely a cursory goodbye to the others, slipping out of the glass front doors. Hayden watches Shane fish his phone out of his pocket just outside and bring it to his ear. Maybe already calling Boston Lily to discuss the… the dick pic.
So she had a dick. Boston Lily had a dick. Hm. Not what Hayden had been expecting by any metric. Was that why Shane had hidden her for so long? Because she had a dick? But why would she have a penis, unless-
It all clicks into place for Hayden. Shane’s yearly donations to queer charities. His touchiness about the guys on the team making derogatory jokes. His secrecy about Lily, even to Hayden.
Lily was trans. She was a transwoman, and Shane was too afraid to tell the team that.
“Oh my god.” Hayden, mortified, couldn’t help but recall every time he had laughed at an offensive joke or not called out one of the guys on the team saying something shitty. Sure, he had gotten better about it as he’d gotten older and learned more, but no fucking wonder Shane didn’t feel comfortable telling him. It’s not like Hayden was walking around with an ally pin on!
Distraught, Hayden stood abruptly from his bar stool. He finds JJ beside the pool table, losing terribly to Gilbert, and he hauls him away with a hand on either shoulder. JJ yelps a strangled noise, struggling until Hayden manages to bodily turn around his teammate to realize it was him. JJ puts a hand on Hayden’s shoulder to steady himself, looking incredulous at whatever panicked look Hayden had in his eye.
“Buddy, what the fuck-”
“JJ, man” Hayden says desperately, “we’ve gotta get woker now.”
But how did one go about that? Hayden wasn’t sure. He already joined Shane every year in his annual pledge to whatever charity it was he supported- and oh, God, Hayden couldn’t even remember the name of the charity. How on earth was he going to be a good ally if he couldn’t remember the name of the charity? One day into his allyship and he was already doing a terrible job.
So Hayden needed to be aggressive about this. He needed to show he was a good guy, and Lily being trans didn’t matter at all. Or, er, it did matter, and it was wonderful that she was trans? Good for her? He means, great for her! But it didn’t impact Hayden’s ability to accept her wholeheartedly as Shane’s girlfriend and as a woman! Not that Hayden’s opinion on her womanhood mattered, it wasn’t subject to his approval or anything….
Hayden realized he probably needed to talk to some trans women in order to properly grasp the do’s and don’ts of this situation. But he didn’t really know any trans women, was the problem. It wasn’t that he refused their friendship, he would (especially right now) welcome it wholeheartedly, but he didn’t exactly know where to meet them. And cruising around transwoman-frequented spots to harvest advice would be very strange of him. So he’d educate himself from the internet, and start small to show Shane that he was supportive.
He starts, simply, with trying to show he was down with supporting trans artists.
Shane is over at his house as Jackie helps sew a torn up quilt. He sits on the couch, Arthur on his knee, and quietly baby-talks babbles back at his honorary nephew. Hayden sits nervously nearby, trying to figure out how to integrate this into a conversation normally.
“You listen to music?” he asks Shane stupidly, and then winces at his own stupidity.
“Uh, yeah. I guess. Lily’s been recommending me some cool rock stuff recently,” Shane shrugs.
Hayden, having small children, hasn’t listened to much outside of The Wiggles in weeks. But still, he boasts the small amount of research he had done.
“I’m, uh, trying out electro-pop music recently.”
“Electro-pop?” Shane asks with a furrow of his brows, finally looking away from Arthur and towards Hayden. “You’re listening to electro-pop?”
“Yep. Super cool genre. I got put onto this Kim Petras girl. Super talented,” Hayden says. Kim Petras had been one of the first results when he had googled ‘trans women singers.’ Hayden wasn’t too into her genres himself, but some of it was getting nichely popular and he could see why people would enjoy it.
“I’ve never heard of her,” Shane says, not exactly dismissively but not interested either. Hayden had been hoping Shane would know her already. Though she was still quite small. Hayden had thought Lily would’ve known of her, but then he reprimanded himself. Not every trans woman had to be aware of every other trans woman.
“She’s amazing. You know, she gets a lot of hate because she’s so… vocal. About trans stuff.” Hayden winces at how he says it. God, could he be any worse at this? “I mean, she’s one of the premier trans artists. It’s amazing what she’s doing for that community.”
“Oh, that’s cool?” Shane doesn’t look anything other than confused. Damnit. Hayden had at least been hoping for a glimmer of some kind of…. some kind of hope from Shane that acceptance and support was definitely on the table if he were to come out with his girlfriend. Hayden switches tactics.
“I’m also watching a lot of new shows. Have you ever heard of Orange Is The New Black?”
“That prison show? I guess I’ve heard of it,” Shane said with a noncommittal shrug, putting Arthur down onto the rug so he could return to playing with his magna-tiles. “Is it good?”
“Yeah. Totally worth it for Lavender Cox alone. She’s so talented and breaking so many barriers.”
“Do you mean Laverne Cox?” Jackie asks in a shout, her voice carrying over from the dining room where she was working on the quilt.
Damnit. Now Hayden can’t even remember a trans woman’s name properly. He was so bad at this. He internally promises to donate more money than usual to that charity Shane liked. As soon as he remembered the name.
“Oh, shit,” Shane says as he looks at his phone.
“Swear jar!” Jackie reminds them from the dining room.
“Sorry, my mom’s called me a bunch. I’ve gotta go. I’ll pick the quilt up later, Jackie, thanks for the help!” Shane is out of the door in a second. Since when had he mastered the art of the quick exit like that?
Hayden sags against the couch and sighs. Arthur is chewing on his magnatiles on the floor. A few moments later Jackie wandered in from the dining room with Amber on her hip.
“Is there a reason you’ve started to become very supportive of trans actresses or…?”
“For love, Jackie,” Hayden sighed. “For love.”
Hayden steps up his game. The recovery month of June begins, and simultaneously, Pride Month. He had never done much for pride month beyond his annual donation (to The Trevor Project, which in addition to vowing to never forget the name again he donated a very generous sum,) with Shane during the voyager’s pride night, but he plans on not being so lazy this year with it. This year he would take the initiative.
He starts off with a charity gala for The Trevor Project, both so he can learn more about the organization and maybe meet some people who could help with education resources, and then attends a drag brunch on recommendation of one of the women he meets there. That was a great time, and had served as his monthly ‘date night’ with Jackie. She had a fantastic time, and was more than happy to join him as he learned. Though she wasn’t free all the time (four kids made scheduling hard,) so for Hayden’s next event, he goes at it alone.
He attends Montreal pride proudly in his voyageurs t-shirt, and he donates signed pictures of himself (and a few of Shane he had on hand from a charity camp some years ago,) to one of the fundraising stands. In compensation, they hand him a white t-shirt that boasts the slogan ‘Protect The Dolls.’ After asking the stand worker what that meant, he was very pleased to represent such a cause. He doubles-up on his T-shirts despite the heat, letting the Protect The Dolls T-shirt settle on top of his voyagers one.
Hayden wanders around the festivities and the fabulous parade marching through the closed-off streets. Over the course of two hours he shakes too many hands to count and (inexplicably) finds himself hugging just as many people. It was a fantastic time! With how closed-off Shane was, he would never come to such a publicly photographed event. It made Hayden sad that Shane might never experience this kind of a loving and accepting atmosphere. Shane and Lily deserved the chance to be here, and Hayden was going to do everything in his power to help them. Even if he didn’t quite yet know how to do that.
“Hey, Pike!”
Hayden looked over when his name was called. On the Le Cartel pride float was Rose Landry, her red hair in a high ponytail and threaded with rainbow tinsel. She was on the first level of the multi-tiered float in her rainbow Le Cartel T-shirt, and she leaned over the railing to beckon him over with one hand.
Hayden, sunburnt to hell and extremely overheated, graciously accepts the invitation. He had liked Rose during her and Shane’s brief relationship, and he knew her and Jackie still sometimes exchanged recipes. They had gotten close after Rose had requested to spend time with the children in order to prepare for a role where she was a young mother. So he crosses the street and accepts her helping hand as he climbs onto the float, throwing his legs over the railing until he’s standing next to her in the shade provided by the second tier.
“What are you doing here?” He asks Rose, raising his voice over the happy shouting of Montreal’s queer community. Hours in the hot sun hadn’t done anything to dull or weaken their celebrations.
“I’m the brand ambassador for Le Cartel right now. I was in town anyways so I thought I’d join the parade,” Rose shrugs. Her cheeks have been painted with the blue and purple and pink flag, Hayden thinks that one is the bisexual flag. He isn’t sure yet, but he had been trying to learn about the different flags and when to use them. “The better question is what are you doing here? I didn’t see a MLH float!”
“There’s not one! I’m… I’m trying to educate myself,” Hayden says, his slight embarrassment soothed by Rose’s encouraging smile.
“That’s great, man!” She says, and then follows up, tentatively, with, “Is Shane with you?”
“Why would Shane be with me?” Hayden asks. Did Rose know about Lily? Were the flowers colluding? She definitely had said that with a knowing air about her, but what exactly did she know?
“Because he’s your best friend?” Rose said, her own response as defensive as Hayden’s.
Oh, she definitely knew. Hayden remembers briefly that it had been after their breakup that Shane had begun talking more about Lily. Maybe she had helped quell things between them?
“Yeah, he is. He’s not here but... but I’m uh… I’m kinda here for him. Trying to figure out how to be a good friend to him.”
“I see,” Rose nods, a smile pulling at the edge of her lips.
“He doesn’t really know I’m doing any of this or that I know… I don’t know. I just don’t know how to be supportive,” Hayden sighs.
Rose is silent for a second, but then she looks up at him with bright, excited eyes. “I think I know just the thing! But you’ve gotta be open-minded.”
“Yeah, anything. What do you have in mind?”
“Nike is launching a fashion and athletics line for Pride Month, and they’re looking to do an advertisement campaign before the month is up. Miles Mcmillian and Hunter Schafer are already attached, but they’re having trouble finding athletes. They’ve got Scott Hunter already, and I told them I could hook them up with one more guy. I was gonna ask Shane, but-”
“I’ll do it!” Hayden says excitedly. That was perfect! Hunter Schafer’s name had come up in his research, the young high-fashion model would be absolutely perfect to show Shane he was supportive. “God, thanks Rose. You’re such a lifesaver.”
“It’s no problem. But honestly, Pike, you could also talk to him directly. That might be the better strategy here,” She suggests.
“I kinda found out by accident,” Hayden says, skipping over the part where he was snooping around Shane’s messages and had seen Lily’s nudes. “I was hoping I wouldn’t have to fess up to that, but-”
“I get it. I kind of figured it out on my own and just told him I knew, and I wanted him to be happy,” Rose admits with a shrug. Hayden admires her for taking it so…. so well that Shane had been cheating on her with Lily. She really was a saint of a woman. “But after you’ve done the commercial, I’d still just be honest with him. It’s a hard thing to admit.”
Well, hopefully not too hard. Obviously the chances of discrimination from the league were high and enough to give anyone pause, but Shane shouldn’t let Lily think he was ashamed of her. That would be super shitty, and he’d really need to have a heart-to-heart with Shane if that was what was going on. But he’d give Shane the benefit of the doubt for now. Hey, maybe Lily had her own reasons for maintaining secrecy, too.
Hayden is no Shane Hollander when it comes to advertisement campaigns, but he’s pretty damn pleased with himself when all is said and done. It takes a week of shooting in Toronto, but eventually he is greeted with his own smiling face in the lineup of the campaign models on his TV, on billboards, and even once on a bus. A bus! It was kind of strange seeing his own face so often, but he’d endured worse.
In the lineup of photos, Hayden had been most often placed in between Hunter Schafer and some other american footballer he didn’t know. Hunter Schafer’s elbow rested on his shoulder, she was a very respectful young lady and quite pleasant to work with, while Hayden did his best to ‘smoulder’ at the camera, or whatever the director had been shouting at him. All of the photos came out as more of a weird smile on him, but since they had made it to the final stage he assumed it didn’t look too bad. He gets to talk to Scott Hunter while he’s there, and he congratulates him on coming out. Hayden had never even thought there might be closeted players in the league, so it had been a huge shock to him. In the days after he wondered who else might be closeted, but he couldn’t really think of anyone off the top of his head. So he leaves pretty proud of himself, thanks Hunter for her helpful pointers, and then donates half of his paycheck to some of the charities he had learned about at Montreal Pride.
So when July conditioning starts he walks into training with his head held high and his Protect The Dolls t-shirt on. He feels like he’s been earning an A+ in ally recently, so he’s certain the hour of Shane feeling safe enough to tell him about Lily was nigh.
Hayden meets up with Shane as he’s starting his cardio. He takes the treadmill right next to him, trying to be casual.
“You’ve had… a busy summer,” Shane said as he kept up an impressive jog, looking over at Hayden suspiciously.
Hayden doesn’t mind. He knew this was extremely out of character for him, as many of the other guys on the team had rather rudely pointed out, and it would take time for him to gain trust. Just because he had put in pride appearances, had attended an LGBTQ charity gala, a drag brunch, and done the Nike campaign didn’t necessarily undue the years of ignorant and offensive jokes.
“Yeah. It’s been amazing getting to meet all of these cool people. I never realized how vibrant of a community there was in Montreal. Or how much I just didn’t know,” Hayden admits.
Shane looks highly suspicious still. Hayden tries not to take it personally as he speeds up the treadmill a few levels. Him and Shane run in silence for a while before Shane’s phone, propped up on the small ledge of the treadmill’s screen, lights up with a notification from Lily. Hayden barely catches a glimpse before Shane snatched it up.
Lily: I wouldn’t mind.
Lily: If you said something, I mean.
Hayden’s hopes lift. Had he really gotten through to Lily? Had she seen the advertisement campaign?
Impulsive, he springs on the chance.
“I’m gonna do a cook out. I didn’t get to celebrate on the first, so I’m doing one next weekend,” He tells Shane, making shit up. “You could totally come. If you wanted, you could bring Lily. It would be nice to meet her.”
Shane abruptly hit stop on his treadmill. Hayden almost pulls a muscle in his neck as he cranes his head to follow Shane’s path off of the treadmill. He stops his own treadmill with barely enough time to not eat shit, and he steadies his stop with one hand on the rail as he looks back at Shane.
Shane stood at the edge of the treadmill, one hand on the ground and the other rubbing over his eyes. When he pulls his hand away, there’s painfully obvious confliction on his face. He glances at Hayden, and then at his phone, and then sighs.
“I… I’m gonna go use the elliptical.”
Hayden tries not to let the frustration show on his face as Shane walks away. He didn’t know what else he could do to show that he was supportive of him and Lily! Sure, he was happy to keep attending all of these LGBTQ events, but he wanted Shane to know it wasn’t just performative. Hayden was willing to put his money where his mouth was and really support Shane and his girlfriend. He just had to….
Rose’s words come back to him. Maybe he really just did have to be straightforward. He had looked on Shane’s phone, and that would be shitty, but Hayden could admit that and turn it into something positive. He just had to be open and honest to Shane.
So he plans. He spends all of conditioning deep in thought on how to do everything, how to phrase everything, and he eventually decides on a very plain course of action. The grocery store probably still had some of those ginger ale trans-flag edition pride cans, and he’d bring that to Shane’s apartment. It would be best if they could discuss this privately, anyways. Somewhere Shane would be comfortable and they could hash this out all they wanted. One way or another, Hayden would get the truth out.
Hayden texts Jackie he’d be home late, goes to the grocery store, and retrieves the ginger ale. He also grabs an apology card to be safe, scribbling out a note apologizing for accidentally seeing Lily’s nude. Certainly not sufficient, but perhaps a good start. It has a sad little shark on the card and everything.
Armed, he makes his way to Shane’s apartment. He sees Shane’s car parked in the back lot, so he knows he’s home. Which made sense. Shane usually became more reclusive during conditioning and training. Hayden parks right next to Shane’s car before walking around the building to go in the front door. He didn’t have a key to Shane’s emergency stairwell. It’s a good thing he didn’t use it, too, because as he rounds the building he sees a car with deeply tinted windows pull into the back lot way too fast. Hayden might have gotten damn hit if he had been near the stairs.
So he goes in the front and uses his keycard pass to get the elevator up to Shane’s floor. Tapping his foot impatiently, Hayden can only hope this goes well. Obviously he was being a bit pushy but…. but he was Shane’s friend! Hopefully Shane would understand Hayden only wanted to help. And he’d be certainly soothed by the limited edition trans gingerales. It was a perfect mix of him and Lily, after all. They had been a twitch more expensive than the gay pride cans, but Hayden had thought that wouldn’t get his point across as well. So he holds the box under his arm, making sure it’s all carefully secured as he steps off of the elevator and turns towards Shane’s apartment. He has the last on the row, and Hayden carefully maneuvers the apology card to the hand holding the ginger ale so he can press his pass against the door. It opens with a loud whirr and Hayden pushes his way into the dark foyer, the lights pulled low in the house.
Hayden checks his watch with a frown. It was only 8:45. Not late enough for Shane to have turned in yet.
“Shane?” he calls out. “You home?”
There’s no answer. Which didn’t make sense, because Shane’s car was already here. All Hayden can think is that he’s down in the lobby, but he had passed through the lobby on the way here. Had he and Shane taken opposite elevators and missed each other?
Unsure of how to proceed, Hayden wanders to the kitchen. On his way he passes the foyer that holds the emergency exit, and he notices that the door is cracked open. Oh. Shane must be in the stairwell. Maybe he had forgotten something in his car and was going back down to get it. Either way, Hayden is content to be patient. He continues on to the kitchen to place the gingerales down on the counter, carefully arranging the card on top. Once he’s satisfied, he takes a step away and evens out his breaths. Rehearses his careful speech.
Shane, you’re my best friend. I love you so much, and I will always support you and who you love. You should never feel like you have to hide with me, and I’m sorry you’ve had to for so long. But I found out about Lily, and-
Hayden’s internal rehearsal is interrupted by a thump on the other side of the wall that led to the back stairwell. Had Shane fallen? Against the wall? That didn’t sound like him. But Hayden is concerned regardless. He takes a step towards the stairwell, but then he hears it. A moan.
“Fuck yes, just like that,” Shane’s voice is barely audible through the wall, but it’s enough to make Hayden’s ears go pink.
Fuck, is Lily here right fucking now?! Against his better judgement, Hayden steps towards the wall and presses his ear against it. He can just barely hear Shane’s breathy moans and a very wet sucking noise that was definitely someone getting their dick sucked. Based on the lack of Lily’s voice, Hayden was assuming it was Shane.
“You’re so damn…. So good at that,” Shane said, his voice slurred and hazy.
Hayden doesn’t know what to do. First he accidentally sees Lily’s dick pic, and now he’s here while they’re having sex? And he now knows they’re so horned up they can’t even make it out of the stairwell fully? Talk about invading their privacy! Hayden didn’t know how things could get any worse!
Determined the best thing to do is slip back out of the front door, Hayden takes a step towards the front entrance. But before he’s completely out of earshot, he can’t help but hear one more thing.
“So,” a decidedly masculine, decidedly Russian voice asked, slightly out of breath, “when are we going to tell Pike I’m not a woman?”
Hayden stops short in the living room.
“Was that Ilya fucking Rozanov-?”
And if he gets yelled at by Shane for an hour afterwards, well then that’s just a fitting consequence for coming in without a text warning. At least Hayden got to meet ‘Lily’ after all, and he even got a ‘maybe’ on that fake barbecue. No matter how much he wanted to rescind the offer because it was Rozanov. But hey, he had promised that he would love who Shane loved. Even if it was a jackass Russian.