Chapter Text
“You think they are together?”
Shane freezes, looking a bit funny peeking at Ilya under the towel he is currently drying his hair with. “Sorry, what?”
“You think they are together?” Ilya keeps his focus on the TV, his back against the headboard, long legs stretched in front of him.
Shane drops the towel in the laundry basket and pulls on a pair of boxers. "Who are you talking about?”
“My teammates.”
“Which ones?”
“The rookies. Graham and Logan.”
Shane joins the Russian on the bed, slightly fixated on the way Ilya’s fingers move rapidly on the controller. “Graham hasn’t been a rookie in a while.”
Ilya blows a raspberry. “Eh, still rookie to me.”
“As if he isn’t one of the most promising hockey player of the century.”
“He is not that good.”
Shane rolls his eyes. “I saw you drooling over his footwork during the last game. You almost came in your pants right there on the ice.”
Ilya smirks and his eyes flick on Shane before going back to his video-game. “You jealous?”
“Of his hockey skills? Kinda.”
Ilya pauses the game and turns his face toward Shane, nipping at the boy’s shoulder. “Cheeky.”
“Who taught you that word?”
“Your mother.”
“Ilya!”
“No, serious. She says I’m very cheeky. I thought she is talking about my ass, so I say thank you and she laughs in my face. Now I know new word because she explained.”
Shane smiles at the mixed up words and verbs, finding endearing how much Ilya is trying to embrace the language more. He has been following an online course for the past few weeks and trying to talk in more complex sentences.
“Well I can attest you are very cheeky in every department.”
“Thank you Hollander, I try.”
Shane sighs when Ilya pulls him into a kiss. Too quick in his humble opinion, but Ilya seems very interested in the possible gossip. “So you think they are together?”
“Like you and I?”
“Yes Shane, like you and I.”
Shane takes a moment to think about it, replaying in his mind the few interactions he was able to remember between the two players. “I don’t think so? But I’m not in your locker room.”
“You wish.”
Shane playfully slaps Ilya on his arm. “Why do you ask?”
“They are weird. Close. Very close. Lot of jokes but private, like you and I have.”
“Inside jokes?”
“Yes, those. I was missing word. They also say I love you. A lot. But that is maybe American thing. You are all so fucking emotional.”
“Hey, I’m Canadian!”
“Even worse. Emotional AND boring.”
Shane takes a moment to just admire Ilya. The late afternoon light is filtering trough the blinds, growing more and more golden every moment, making Ilya’s curls almost glow like a halo. He looks like a fallen angel lounging on his white sheets, too beautiful for his own good. “Yeah, so boring.”
Ilya cocks is head to the side, catching the slight change in Shane’s voice. It’s softer. Breathier. “How about you answer me and then we stop talking about them?”
Shane bites his lower lip in a way than makes Ilya’s almost too distracted, but he genuinely wants Shane’s opinion of this.
“No. I don’t think so.”
“They are always together. Like glue.”
“Don’t they have girlfriends?”
“You had girlfriend and you are very gay now.”
“I was very gay back then Ilya. You can ask Rose.”
“Maybe they are both faking.”
“Or maybe the are just very good friends.”
Ilya fingertips start dancing on Shane’s thigh, higher and higher at every lazy up and down stroke. “Good friends like you and me?”
Shane locks eyes with him and suddenly Ilya doesn’t give a fuck about his teammates anymore. “No. Never like you and me.”
“They are so fucking.”
Hannah freezes than looks around to check nobody heard Grace’s words. “Why do we always have to make people recognize us like this?”
Grace giggles and leans back in her seat. “Sorry.”
Hannah rolls her eyes but goes back to following the game, elbows on her knees, the true image of the focused WAG. “Oh well, we’ll never belong to this world anyway. Spill, Gracie.”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“Nope.”
“Oh come on!”
“Hey, sorry my man is actually playing and I’m not picking up on the subtleties of your busybody conjectures.”
Grace sticks her tongue out but leans forward too. She lowers her voice. “Hollander and Rozanov.”
The game was quickly forgotten.
“The captains?!”
“Duh.”
“Metros Hollander?”
“Uh uh.”
“And our very own Rozanov?”
“Is there another Rozanov I don’t know about?”
“Grace.”
“Hannah.”
The two girls stare each other down, shock against conviction.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“They hate each other.”
“That just makes it hotter.”
Hannah flushes but doesn’t correct Grace’s point.
See, the thing about Grace was that she was rarely wrong. She was extraordinarily insightful and had a knack for reading subtle cues. She also didn’t speak just to hear herself talk.
So Hannah’s expression narrows suspiciously. “What do you know?”
Grace lights up like a Christmas tree. “So glad you ask me.”
Hannah takes a sip of her drink to hide her blooming laugh.
“Well leaving aside the obvious sexual charge between them during faceoffs, so thick you could cut it with a knife…” The blond girl gestures back to the rink where the two captains are bent down in front of the referee, waiting for the puck to drop.
Hannah peers down at the game. The two men are a little bit closer than usual, but there is nothing inherently weird about that. “Not a valid proof, Miss Ivers. Hockey is an intense game, they could just be very in the zone.”
“Point taken, Mrs Graham.”
Hannah lips curl up at the surname and she twirls the ring on her finger. It is still new, barely a few weeks since the wedding, but it warms her from inside out. “Other details to summit to the court?”
“Of course, counselor.”
“I feel like Sabrina would be so proud of us for the lingo we are spouting out.”
“We are totally fucking it up.”
“Oh probably.”
Hannah knocks into Grace’s shoulder with her own. “This is fun though. Go on then.”
“I’d like to enlighten the court to the behavior of Mr Rozanov and Mr Hollander on the ice. They move like magnets and cross paths too often to be just coincidence. Brushing against each other, always ready to smash each other into the boards...”
“They are tuned in on the other one cause they are the best players of their respective teams. Again reaching, miss Ivers.”
“Best players? If Garrett heard you he’d be threatening divorce right now.”
Hannah trows her head back in laughter. “He’s definitely my favorite player and he knows that.”
“I bet.” Grace smirks suggestively and almost gets pushed out of her chair.
She gets her balance back and drops her eyes back on the game, perfectly in synchro with Logan’s first time on the ice of the night. “Let’s go Johnny!”
“Focus Grace. You can’t leave me hanging here, I know you got more up your sleeve.”
Grace suddenly tenses and glances around. “Keep this to yourself?”
“Of course. You know me.” Hannah’s cheerful expression turns serious.
“I might have seen them making out yesterday.”
Hannah’s mouth drops open. “When did-? How?”
Their voices are barely a whisper, almost unintelligible over the chaos of noise filling the stadium.
“Logan was putting in some extra hours on the ice yesterday evening, so I dropped over after my last course of the day to surprise him. I was waiting for him in my car when Ilya motherfucking Rozanov comes out of the side entrance and gets in the car of, who would it guess, fucking Shane Hollander.” Grace takes another look over their shoulders, but nobody is even remotely interested in them. “It was dark as fuck and, except for me, nobody was in the parking lot. Hannah, they were all over each other as soon is Rozanov stepped in the car.”
“Did you tell Logan?”
Grace twirls her hair in an anxiety induced tick. “Nope. I don’t even know if I should… I mean, it is not really my place. I wasn’t even supposed to be there.”
Hannah takes a gulp of her beer, a hand brushing away brown locks from her face. “Yeah. Yeah. Better to keep it to ourselves…”
The two women turn back to the game, neither actually registering the plays being made in front of their eyes. For a few minutes there is just silence between them.
“But-”
“However-”
A nervous laugh bubbles up when they talk all over each other.
Grace shrugs. “I feel like it would be nice for them to know they would have someone on their side.”
Hannah melts a little against the back of the chair and drops a hand on Grace’s arm. “As someone who is not a newbie at keeping secrets that weight heavily on the way one relates to the world, support is never wrong. But the way one goes in offering it can be detrimental.”
“Should we tell Garrett and Logan?”
Hannah sighs. “It’s not our secret to share. And while I know they would be 100% on board with it, I would talk at least to Ilya first.”
“Why did we have to have the most difficult one of the couple as captain?” Grace giggles.
Hannah pulls out her phone and starts checking her calendar, always one to face things head on. “Time for a very awkward dinner at the Grahams, I guess. You and Logan free on Friday?”