Chapter Text
Monday
Ilya couldn’t remember the game against the Metros.
The images were blurry in his mind, as if shrouded in a thick fog. He played hockey because that’s what he’d always done. Because it was his job. Therefore, he wandered around the ice with a single goal: to score. To put the puck in the back of the net. Maybe if he scored enough goals, the referee would end this damn game. Then he could finally get some news about Shane. Why wasn’t anyone giving him any news about Shane?
“How’s Hollander doing?” he asked his coach during the line change.
“I still don’t have any more information than the last time you asked, Rozanov,” the man replied, visibly annoyed, before barking out instructions to the other players paying him no further attention. However, when he saw that Ilya still wasn’t moving, he finally shouted over the boards:
“We can’t afford to lose when the opposing team’s star player is out of the game—what would that make us look like? They would’ve called off the game if he died! Get your ass in gear and focus on the game for fuck’s sake!”
He ended his tirade with a vigorous slap on Ilya’s shoulder, which sent him sliding a little further across the ice. They had to keep playing. As long as no one called off the game, Shane was still alive. That’s why he had to keep playing. He knew how. He could do it. For Shane.
Ilya didn’t ask Coach LeClaire for any more updates on Shane.
At the end of regulation, the Raiders won the game on three goals that Ilya didn’t even remember scoring.
Tuesday
The next day, Ilya was outside the hospital at dawn. Visiting hours didn’t start for another hour at least, and he wouldn’t be able to see Shane anyway. His parents had surely driven down from Ottawa overnight. He hadn’t seen them in the stands the day before. Not that he’d been paying much attention, mind you. They were surely at Shane’s bedside, and Ilya would have a very hard time explaining why the captain of the bastard who’d sent their son to the hospital was coming to visit him, his eyes puffy with exhaustion and anguish.
Ilya hadn’t slept a wink all night. How could he? As soon as his eyelids closed, he saw Shane’s lifeless body again. The sound of his helmet—or was it his skull?—hitting the ice echoed endlessly in his ears, like a macabre tinnitus.
He stubbed out his cigarette, then, in the same motion, pulled his pack out of his coat and tucked a new cigarette between his lips. His gaze wandered from window to window along the hospital’s facade, trying—without much hope—to catch a glimpse of freckles behind the curtains.
He didn’t know why he’d come. His flight to Boston was scheduled to take off in three hours, and he should already be on his way to the airport. But he couldn’t leave Montreal without hearing from Shane.
He refreshed the news sites regularly. Journalists were always the first to know everything. No new article announcing the tragic death of MLH’s best player. Good. He exhaled a puff of smoke. The hospital was slowly beginning to come to life. Ilya watched every movement closely. Maybe Shane would be the next one to open his curtain?
Ilya felt ridiculous standing in the visitor reception area. He didn’t even know if Shane had been admitted to this hospital. He was almost certain that a tabloid had mentioned this facility, but the article was in French and Ilya wasn’t sure if the translator hadn’t misled him.
Just as he was still hesitating to turn around and pretend he’d never been there, his eyes met those of the receptionist and he knew immediately that she had recognized him. If he’d had any doubt, the Metros pin displayed on her shirt would have convinced him that he was standing in front of a hockey fan. It was too late to back out now.
He couldn’t see Shane.
“Only family members are allowed to visit,” the receptionist – Christine—seemed genuinely sorry when she broke the news. “It’s hospital’s policy, you must understand.”
No. No, he didn’t understand. None of it made sense. He was certainly the person Shane had been closest to. They’d planned to meet the day before… before the accident. Shane would surely be happy to see him. Or at least wouldn’t refuse to see him. He knew him. They knew each other. Ilya wasn’t his family, but he was… what? His rival? His regular hookup? His… friend. Yes, they were friends, in a way. It was normal to visit your friends when they were sick.
“Can I leave message?” Ilya asked, pretending to write in the air.
Christine nodded toward the side of the desk where there was a notepad and a pen. Ilya stepped aside to write his note.
Ilya had a thousand things he wanted to say to Shane, and yet, the words wouldn’t come to him. He knew he couldn’t be too honest—anyone could read his letter. He had to stay professional. Shane would understand. He’d text back saying everything was fine—more scare than harm—and that he’d call him tonight on FaceTime. If he hopped in a taxi right now, Ilya still had a chance to catch his flight to Boston and be home in time for the call with Shane. Yes, that’s exactly what was going to happen.
The letterhead with the hospital’s logo and name took up half the page, so he had to be brief. “Get well soon. See you in the playoffs. The Raiders.” There. Professional. A fine display of sportsmanship.
He folded the note, wrote “For Hollander” on top, and handed it to Christine.
“How…,” he began. He had to know. He cleared his throat. “Everyone on my team is really sorry about the accident. Marleau is really sorry. Everyone wants to hear good news. How’s Hollander? Is he okay?”
Christine looked sheepish, turned her head to the left, then to the right, and then leaned forward as if to tell him a secret:
“I shouldn’t tell you this, but can I count on your discretion?” she whispered. Ilya didn’t know how a hockey fan who was aware of his public reputation could think he was the discreet type. But it just so happened that he could be—especially when it came to Shane. He nodded in agreement.
“Mr. Hollander is a celebrity here; news spreads faster than it should, and the reporters will find out soon enough anyway, so I might as well tell you.”
The more she talked, the more Ilya wanted to strangle her. Couldn’t she just get to the point?
“He took a nasty blow to the head…”
Once again, the sound of Shane’s head hitting the ice—which had been haunting him since the previous evening—echoed in his ears. “Nasty” was an understatement.
“…and his collarbone is broken…”
He would recover from a collarbone injury. He surely wouldn’t be able to play in the playoffs, though. Ilya thought back to what he’d written in his note. Shane would think he was making fun of him. But then again, Ilya wasn’t supposed to know this information.
“…but the most serious injury is to his ribs. My friend Marie-Eve, who works in the ER, told me that a piece of bone broke off his rib and punctured his lung. Mr. Hollander spent part of the night in surgery. He had just come out of the operating room when I started my shift this morning. As of the latest update, he’s still in the ICU.”
Ilya’s breath caught in his throat when he heard “punctured lung,” and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to breathe ever again. He didn’t understand. Shane was in the hospital; he must be okay. That’s what hospitals are for, right? To take care of people. To take care of Shane. Therefore, this Christine lady, must have just told him that Shane was getting better. He just hadn’t understood because of the language barrier and her French accent, which made it even harder for him to understand English.
“What does ‘ICU’ mean?” he asked with feigned calm, because he couldn’t afford to panic in the lobby of a public hospital in the center of Montreal.
“Oh, right, excuse me—you’re Russian, aren’t you?” Without waiting for an answer, she continued, “Um, the intensive care unit is the ward for people who’ve just come out of surgery but are still asleep.”
“Oh, so he is sleeping.”
Shane was resting. It was a good way to heal. Shane was always telling him to rest when he was injured. Ilya never listened to him. Next time, he would listen. Shane always knew best. Shane followed his own advice. “He’ll wake up soon, right?”
Once again, Christine looked uneasy.
“Not quite, he’s not really asleep. No one knows when he’ll wake up. It’s more like… a coma.”
Ilya knew that word. He didn’t like that word. A nasty, very serious word that shouldn’t be associated with Shane. Ever.
“But he’ll be okay, right?”
“I’m not a doctor, Mr. Rozanov,” she said, shrugging. “The kid’s our star here; we watch all the Metros’ games in the break room. We’re all praying he’ll wake up soon. I know this isn’t the good news you wanted to bring back to your team—I’m truly sorry.”
“Um da, yeah, I should…” Ilya didn’t really know what to do. He certainly shouldn’t cry, but that’s exactly what he wanted to do right then and there. He couldn’t stay here.
Just as he took a step back to run away somewhere – anywhere—far from the bad news and hospitals that didn’t heal people, Christine stopped him:
“I haven’t dared ask you this since earlier, but my boyfriend is a huge Raiders fan. Would you mind signing an autograph for him?”
Ilya hadn’t gotten very far. He’d barely had time to reach the bathroom before the overwhelming flood of emotions choked him and he threw up into the toilet. Shane was in a coma. The news was slowly sinking in. The more the words swirled around in his head, the heavier the weight of reality pressed down on Ilya. Coma. There were people who had never woken up from a coma. No, he shouldn’t think about that. Shane was going to wake up. Shane was strong; he was young and healthy. Every morning he drank a smoothie that smelled like grass and tasted like lawn to stay healthy. He was going to pull through.
Ilya splashed water on his face to clear his head. He couldn’t leave now. He still had time to make it to the airport, but what for? He didn’t have a game until the following Friday. He could take a later flight, once Shane would be awake. He had to be there if Shane needed him. Not that he could actually do much. He wasn’t a doctor. He couldn’t hold his hand to reassure him; he wasn’t even allowed to know Hollander’s room number. He wasn’t family. He was nothing to Shane.
Yet the anguish Ilya felt at the mere thought that Shane might never wake up didn’t seem like “nothing.” All the time they’d spent together—for nearly ten years since they’d met, meeting in secret whenever the chance arose. That wasn’t “nothing.” It had existed.
If he left now and went back to Boston, to another country, while Shane might never wake up—then… then it would be as if “THEY” had never existed. Ilya would be the only one to remember that Ilya and Shane had once been more than just rivals on the ice and in life. Ilya would be the only witness to the part of Shane that Hollander was hiding from the world. If Shane didn’t wake up, he would bury his secrets—and Ilya along with them. Because if Shane didn’t wake up, Ilya would have to erase ten years of memories and never speak of them to anyone again.
But Shane was going to wake up, and Ilya could get his life back, return to Boston, and keep his memories safely tucked away in his heart.
Ilya needed a goal. Something to keep him from dwelling on his anxiety long enough to think clearly about the next step in his plan. He also needed a cup of coffee, which seemed like a simple enough goal to achieve given how tired and on edge he was. He had almost reached the end of his journey, after following an endless series of arrows, when something made him stop in his tracks. A voice—one he knew all too well, since it belonged to none other than his alternate captain: Cliff Marleau.
Ilya didn’t want to run into Cliff right now. He was the person closest to being Ilya’s best friend; he’d know immediately that something was wrong. Ilya wouldn’t be able to lie to him, not when he hadn’t slept in two days and his heart felt like it was trying to leap out of his throat with every beat.
If Cliff asked him even a single question right now, Ilya would tell him everything. He’d tell him how much he loved Shane and how badly that scared him. He’d tell him that for years he’d tried to fight this attraction but, in the end, he’d only been lying to himself. He’d tell him that he felt lost, like a child, and that he no longer knew what to do or think at all. He’d tell him that he needed help. He’d tell him all of that, right there, in front of everyone, surrounded by coffee machines and snack vending machines. That would be a terrible idea.
He was about to turn around to hide in the restroom a little longer when a second voice made him look back. Hayden F* Pike. Ilya hated him more out of principle than genuine animosity. The man had spent more nights than he had in the same room as Shane, and for that reason alone, his aversion was justified in the eyes of the Universe. The fact that those nights had been completely platonic and strictly professional was no mitigating factor.
Now, what was Cliff doing with the Metros’ 15th-best player? “What was Cliff doing at the hospital?” should have been his first question, but he hadn’t slept in… far too long, that was for sure. Give him a break. Intrigued, he cautiously stepped around the corner of the hallway to take a discreet peek.
Cliff Marleau and Hayden Pike were indeed facing each other, and standing next to Pike were two people Ilya recognized immediately—he’d seen them before from a distance at galas, in the stands during games, or at award ceremonies. Shane’s parents.
Shane’s father looked exhausted—the kind of exhaustion that comes from doing nothing but waiting, powerless to act. Emotional exhaustion compounded his physical fatigue, etching his features into a pale mask, his eyes wandering, veiled in a blue haze. As for Shane’s mother… she was certainly not on her first cup of coffee. They seemed worried but not sad, which reassured Ilya. They would be devastated if Shane was… if the prognosis was bad, wouldn’t they? So that meant Shane was alive.
Cliff looked stunned, as if he’d just heard some bad news. Which was certainly the case, in truth.
“I honestly thought he’d seen me,” Cliff said, visibly holding back his emotions. “Hollander is always so focused on the ice. I’ve played against him dozens of times; I’ve studied hundreds of videos of the Metros in practice. This is the first time I’ve ever seen him turn around while he has the puck. It’s incomprehensible. I’m so, incredibly sorry.”
Yuna placed her hand on Marleau’s shoulder, and Ilya felt a twinge of jealousy in his chest. Oh, what he would give to be in his friend’s place, to receive comfort from the mother of the man who had been occupying his thoughts day and night for years. Cliff didn’t deserve such leniency. He was responsible for this whole situation! He’d sent Shane’s skull crashing into the ice rink; he’d broken his ribs and punctured his lung. He’d… he hadn’t wanted any of this. He hadn’t made a mistake. It was Shane who’d lost his focus right in the middle of a professional hockey game—a sport known for being violent and dangerous. However, Ilya refused to hold Shane responsible for his condition, so he couldn’t blame Cliff either. But the temptation to find someone to direct his anger at was overwhelming.
“It’s true that he seemed upset before the game,” Pike commented. “He kept checking his phone, as if he was waiting for a message that never came.”
Suddenly, Ilya knew with certainty where to redirect his anger and hatred. At himself.
He was responsible for this disaster. It was his message that Shane was waiting for. He was the one who had deliberately ignored those texts, to protect himself. Because Ilya had planned to break up with him that night.
Shane’s overly enthusiastic messages—unusual coming from his lover—had thrown him off. Shane had asked him three times if he was still coming over to the condo after the game. As if he was expecting something, as if he was hoping for something. Ilya hadn’t liked how that made him feel. So, he’d decided to ignore Shane and focus on his game, not realizing that this small, seemingly inconsequential decision would lead to a full-blown disaster. Ilya was going to be sick.
Shane was dying, and it was entirely his fault.