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Shane pauses with his hand on the sleek, cool metal of the hotel door handle.
He feels hollow, which is such an unfamiliar feeling to have after meeting with Rozanov. Usually, when they’re together is the only time Shane truly feels whole. Like all the parts of him finally get to exist at the same time.
He loves hockey more than anything - it’s not just his career but the biggest piece of him, something stitched into the lining of his soul - but even on the ice he’s hiding a part of who he is. He has to tuck away the version of him that only one person has ever been allowed to meet.
Rozanov never asks Shane to pretend to be something he’s not.
He’s as turned on by Shane Hollander Hockey Player, as he is by the Hollander who he pins to the bed and takes apart. Rozanov knows that the guy he meets on the ice can still want what he wants in the bedroom, and the guy in the bedroom can still kick his ass on the ice.
But sex with Rozanov has never felt so…empty, before.
Good, always so fucking good, but like the thing that always makes it exceptional between them was missing.
From the moment he’d stepped into the penthouse Shane could feel the distance between them, like a crack in the earth turning them into two separate islands. Two people who were once connected, but are now so far apart.
He doesn’t know what to do.
His chest aches violently, like something has been torn from it. Like his heart is still in the bed beside Rozanov, and Shane is about to walk out of the door and leave it behind.
He could leave right now, and never look back. He could let everything between them die here in this hotel room, and finally let go of this impossible thing he’s spent years trying to hold onto. He could, but.
There’s something inside of Shane that is screaming for Rozanov. There is something begging Shane to turn around, to go to him, to find out what is wrong. Because he knows there is something. This isn’t Rozanov; however casual they claim to be, Rozanov is never distant, never so removed from the things they do under the cover of nightfall. He never treats Shane like he doesn’t matter.
Shane hears the rustle of sheets and a low, elongated sigh. Rozanov sounds so miserable it hurts. Shane closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, then turns back around.
The Vegas skyline is to his right, stretching for miles upon sparkling miles. There’s a whole world out there, but it feels like the entire universe has narrowed down to this point - to this hotel room, and this man, and this moment. Nothing outside of here matters, at least not for right now.
Shane walks forward, dropping his jacket onto the couch as he passes it. When he finally steps next to the bed, Rozanov is staring forwards like he’s trapped inside his own head, like he has detached from his body; he hasn’t even realised Shane is still there.
“Rozanov?” No response. “Ilya.”
His head whips around to look at Shane, startled by his presence. For just a brief moment there’s an achingly vulnerable expression on Ilya’s face, before he quickly starts to pack it away - the baggage he doesn’t want anyone else to have to carry.
“You are still here.” It’s not a question, but there’s an air of surprise in his voice all the same.
“Yeah, I-“ Shane pauses, takes a breath. “Are you okay?”
“I am fine.”
“Are you sure? Because you don’t really seem it.”
Ilya scoffs. “You should go.”
“Ilya-“
“Stop. You say my name like it means something. Why? This is not anything, Hollander,” he waves his hands between the two of them, “we are not anything.”
The words are vicious, meant to sting enough that Shane flees for the door. But Shane can’t be scared away that easily.
“Who are you trying to convince, Ilya? Me, or yourself?”
The room becomes so silent you could hear a pin drop.
Shane hadn’t known the first - and second - time he shook Ilya’s hand, that he would end up feeling like this about him.
Shane hadn’t even known he liked men, that he was - well, whatever.
He’d just known, as sure as he knew his own name, that Ilya would matter. Shane had thought Ilya might be the only person in the world who would get what he was going through - the pressure, and the expectations, and the fear of failure. He thought they would understand each other.
He didn’t know what this would become at the draft, either, when they’d sat on that hotel gym floor - sweaty, and panting, and feeling like the only two people who existed. He did know he wanted Ilya, though. Knew he wanted to crawl into his lap, straddle those thick thighs, and lick the sweat from Ilya’s neck.
But in every moment since - every clandestine meeting, every face off, every kiss or touch or chirp - Shane had known this was never going to stay casual.
Whatever they were telling themselves, whatever lies they needed to believe to keep the weight of it from suffocating them, it was always going to become something bigger than they were allowed to want.
Bigger than they could dream of having.
“Go, please,” Ilya begs, his voice shaking like the words don’t want to be spoken.
Like maybe he would ask Shane to stay, if he could. If he knew how.
“No.”
“Shane.”
It slips out; he doesn’t mean to say it. Shane can tell from the way Ilya’s face contorts, almost like he’s trying to take it back - like he’s trying to un-say Shane’s name, un-learn the taste of it in his mouth. But it’s out there now, hovering in the space between them. Heavy, despite its fragility.
Shane steps toward the bed. He doesn’t ask, doesn’t hesitate, just sits down beside Ilya, close enough that their knees knock together.
Ilya closes his eyes.
Shane rests his hand on Ilya’s thigh.
“Talk to me,” Shane pleads.
It’s probably ridiculous. Probably asking for far too much. They don’t do this, don’t talk about anything real. But Ilya has fucked him then ghosted him before, and he refuses to let it become a pattern.
(Shane is lying to himself. He would let Ilya do it again and again and again; he’ll keep handing over pieces of himself until Ilya refuses to take them, simply because he can’t let this go.)
Shane knows why Ilya does it, of course. He knows it’s because Ilya is hurting over something, that he’s struggling with things he won’t let anyone else see. And if Ilya is anything at all like Shane, then being together makes him want to be honest in ways that are too big and too scary.
It’s easier to run. Easier to disappear, go silent, pretend that more isn’t right at the tip of his fingers, if only he was brave enough to reach for it.
But Shane has to try this time. He has to offer Ilya a life raft, and just hope that he takes it.
“I’m here. I’ll listen. Just stop - stop hiding.”
“I am going back to Russia soon.”
Ilya’s voice is tight, choked, like the honesty is costing more than he has to give, but he’s still trying anyway. Still opening up to the first person who has bothered to ask.
Sometimes, Shane thinks Ilya seems so lonely.
“…okay.”
Ilya had said that earlier, right before he tried to send Shane packing. He’d said it once before, too, in that solemn, resigned tone, like Russia is an obligation instead of his home.
“I don’t like going back there,” Ilya confesses. “It changes me. Makes me…mean.”
Ilya sighs. He bends his knees, pulling them up towards his chest, and the cover slips off him to reveal toned thighs covered in a light smattering of coarse, blonde hair. Shane takes his hand and curls it around the back of Ilya’s calf, a touch to ground him in the here and now - to keep his mind from returning to Russia before his body does.
Ilya’s eyes flutter closed at the contact, and his head thuds back against the headboard.
“Is hard for me, back there. Too many bad things, and bad people, and bad memories.”
“You don’t have to go back.”
Ilya opens his eyes, fixing them on Shane as he smiles sadly. “Yes. I do.”
Shane knows a little something about expectations, but perhaps not in the way Ilya does. For Shane, his family and their home in Ottawa has always brought him comfort. His mom might be a little overbearing sometimes, his dad a little too soft, but Shane has never doubted their love for him - never doubted that, above everything, they want him to be happy.
He can’t imagine how it must feel, not having your home be a safe place to land. He can’t imagine what Ilya has been through, that even the thought of Russia changes him so entirely.
The Ilya that the press, and the public, and most of the league know - he isn’t the same Ilya that Shane sees when they’re alone. Sure, he’s an asshole. Sure, he’s arrogant and taunting and full of himself. But Ilya is also gentle, and patient, and careful.
He’s kind in a way that is unflinching, even in the face of Shane’s defensiveness.
Shane hates that Russia - and whoever is waiting for him there - takes that away from Ilya. But survival tactics are funny that way; they turn you into the worst version of yourself as a means of protection.
“You can text me, if you want. While you’re there,” Shane offers. “No pressure, or anything. Just - if you need an escape, or whatever.”
The glimmer in Ilya’s eyes as he looks at Shane is unlike anything he’s ever seen before. There’s an unbearable softness to it - an almost dreamlike quality to the way Ilya is watching him, smiling.
“You are far too good for me, Shane Hollander.”
“I don’t think that’s true at all.”
Ilya shakes his head, and he reaches up a hand to play with the chain around his neck. He glances down at it briefly, rubs the cross between his finger and thumb, then looks back to Shane.
“I can’t talk about Russia with you,” he says, and it makes Shane’s heart sink a little. But then Ilya continues, “Not today. Not yet. But - but someday, maybe? Is that okay?”
“Whenever,” Shane tells him. “Whenever you’re ready to talk, I’ll be here.”
It’s a big promise to make, but it’s one Shane knows he will have no trouble in keeping. He’s in this. He couldn’t walk away even if he tried, and he’s tried.
“Thank you,” Ilya whispers.
He places his hand down on the bed, palm up, and moves it almost imperceptibly closer to Shane’s leg. He doesn’t make a move to touch him - almost like he’s not sure if he’s allowed, not sure if he deserves to - but it’s an offering.
It’s Ilya saying: this is what I can give you right now.
Shane takes it.
He touches the tips of his fingers to the tips of Ilya’s, gentle but not uncertain. Then Shane slowly slides his hand across Ilya’s until their palms are pressed together, thumbs hooked around each others, and Shane’s fingers are pressed to the place where Ilya’s pulse thrums beneath the blue-green veins in his wrist.
“I am so sorry, Shane, about tonight. If I made you-“
“-no. No, Ilya. It was good. I wanted it…I always want you,” Shane confesses, his eyes fixed firmly on their joined hands.
The words are too honest, but perhaps it’s time for that. Perhaps, in this little bubble - with the rest of the world feeling like a million miles away - it’s okay to show Ilya some of his truth.
“You still deserved better than what I gave you tonight.”
Shane shrugs one of his shoulders. It’s true, but he understands. The last few times they’ve interacted off the ice, it was either before Ilya went back to Russia or in Russia. Shane can’t - won’t, would never - hold that against him. Not now that he understands a little better.
“I am feeling a lot of…not good things,” Ilya admits, “but that is not your fault. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”
“I understand, Ilya.”
He shakes his head. “You shouldn’t have to understand. I can’t promise you much, but I can promise that I will never treat you like that again. So…coldly.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
There’s a beat of silence between them, where the only sound is the distant hum of traffic and the wail of a siren somewhere down below. Ilya watches his own thumb as it brushes back and forth over Shane’s knuckles, making him shiver. Shane catches the way Ilya’s mouth curves into a satisfied smirk.
“For what it’s worth,” Ilya begins, “I always want you, too.”
Shane’s breath shudders as he exhales. When their gazes meet, he can see Ilya’s vulnerability - can see the truth hidden in his hazel eyes. It isn’t just a thing he is saying so Shane doesn’t feel alone in this; he means it.
“You can have me.”
Ilya laughs, but it isn’t cruel. It’s disbelieving. “I’m not sure if that is possible.”
Shane knows that. Of course he does. There’s no world in which this - whatever this is - works out. Not really.
They’re both professional athletes in a sport that has never had an out player. Their rivalry has been the centre of the NHL’s marketing since they entered the league. They’re hundreds of miles and too many hours apart, except for four measly times a season.
They don’t stand a chance.
“But we could try.”
Ilya smiles, tugs on Shane’s hand to pull him closer, and says, “Yes, okay. We can try.”
Shane kicks his shoes off again, doesn’t bother to place them neatly at the foot of the bed, and he crawls into the space that Ilya makes for him. He doesn’t have to worry about where to put his body, because Ilya pulls him in close - winds his arms around Shane and presses a kiss to the top of his head.
Shane could live here, he thinks, wrapped in Ilya’s arms.
“I didn’t even kiss you,” Ilya murmurs.
“You can do it now,” Shane offers.
There’s a hand beneath his chin, tilting his head upwards, and then Ilya is kissing him.
There’s no hurry to it, no intention behind it, just a deliciously slow, sweet press of their lips. And that empty feeling inside of Shane is suddenly filled with the warmth of Ilya’s affection.
Shane melts into the kiss, reaching a hand up to tangle his fingers into Ilya’s curls. Ilya sighs into Shane’s mouth, as if his body is finally relaxing now - as if Shane’s touch, his kiss, was all that he needed to settle the unease inside of him.
“Better?” Ilya asks.
“Better.”
“Will you stay?”
“Yeah, Ilya, I’ll stay.”
Shane’s not sure if he’s in love, because he never has been before, but he thinks this is something pretty close. He thinks, if given half the chance, he could fall so in love with Ilya Rozanov that it would change his entire life.
It’s a risk he’s willing to take.