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Shane was tired, exhausted really. He knew he had to eat before going to bed, could feel the hunger gnawing at his insides. He could feel it sitting in his throat. He ignored it in favor of just sitting on his couch staring at the wall across from him. His mind running a million miles an hour while simultaneously running circles around itself. He knew he should shower, he should move to his bed. None of it felt possible. He had a headache, he hated it. He hated everything about it because he wanted to do all of it; he just couldn’t make himself move.
He should call Ilya or at least text him. He just couldn’t. It was too much. He didn’t want to stress over saying the wrong thing and he had already forgotten to reply the day before. He knew Ilya was probably worried about him. He just couldn’t make himself pick up the phone despite the notifications coming in from all over. He felt sick. He could feel his eyelids drooping where he sat. It was quiet, too quiet, his ears were ringing. He should go to bed, he really, really should but there was so much to do and he didn’t have the energy for any of it. He was overwhelmed by just thinking of all the things he should do. He also felt like a real fucking failure for not just being able to get of his ass.
He had tried to eat earlier, key word tried, but after a few bites he gagged so badly that he felt like he was about to throw up. He’d tried to keep going but his eyes filled with tears as he kept gagging on every attempted swallow. He gave up not actually wanting to vomit what little food he’d managed to consume back up again.
Then the hunger came back after less than 30 minutes. It happened almost every day by now. He didn’t know why. He didn’t understand it. He was supposed to be the one who was fine. It wasn’t an eating disorder. It wasn’t. At least not one he had ever heard of. All the ones he knew about either revolve around choosing not to eat because you didn’t like your body or about actually throwing it back up. He didn’t do that so it wasn’t him. He knew he needed to eat. He knew how important it was for his career but it was like his body refused and he didn’t understand why. He hated the feeling of gagging. It was one of the worst things he knew. It was so bad that not even Ilya teased him about it.
He didn’t get why his mind was actively seeming to attack him. He was supposed to be the fine one in their relationship. Ilya was the one with all the trauma. He was the one who had a shitty family and a shitty country and all that. Shane was supposed to be fine. So why wasn’t he? Why wasn’t he okay??? When did getting up and going to practise become such a chore? When did surviving get so hard?
Surviving?
When did it become to survive rather than to live? Shane was fine. He had a great family, they loved him, they supported him. Sometimes they fought but who didn’t? Sometimes he felt like his mother no longer existed and sometimes he would get so mad at his fathers peaceful nature (that really was just him being averse to conflict). Because he would just never side with him on anything, always backing up his mother. Always. Before Ilya it had sometimes felt like he was by himself in everything. His parents had each other, Hayden had Jackie, JJ had his girlfriend and so on. Shane had always been so alone. He had never really had an issue with it. But whenever a fight occurred especially between him and one of his parents no one ever backed him up. It tore at him. More than he realised.
His mother who he sometimes felt like could never take criticism. Who always turned it back on him somehow. Who would compare him to his asshole of a grandmother when she was angry just because she could. It hurt, the comment. It was meant to hurt, he knew but he just stood there quiet and took it. He knew that it’d just be worse if he yelled back.
He loved them, loves them, and they love him. He knows, he's lucky to have them and always will be but.
But.
He felt like he was drowning and he had no reason to. His team wasn’t the best sure but they didn’t kick him off the team and they wouldn’t kill him. Sure he had more bruises than normal at this point in the season but still he was fine. Sure they'd throw around slurs more freely than ever and insult Scott to his face just as another way to tell him how not welcome he was. But he was fine. At least his country didn’t actively try to kill people like him and he wasn’t the one who had to move to a whole new one just to be safe and to be able to love the man he did.
Shane Hollander was fine. Truely. So he got up from the couch and heated up one of his pre-cooked meals in the microwave before sitting down to eat, again. He pulled out his phone to watch something while he ate. The less he focused on the food the easier it was to eat it.
He made it half way through the container before gagging and Shane just stared at his food in betrayal as it happened. He tried again and he gagged. Worse than the first time for a moment he just sat there staring at it. Tears welled in his eyes he pretended they were from the gagging rather than the actual reason behind them. He put his head in his hands, still looking down unblinkingly as his vision blurred. The tears fell into the food container in front of him. After a minute he pulled himself together enough that he just dumped all of his things on the counter and went to bed. He should have taken care of it normally he would have but he just didn’t have the energy and he could deal with it tomorrow.
Shane woke up just as his alarm went off and for a second he was confused. Normally he woke up before his alarm even went off. Was this the first time he didn’t? No he didn’t think so, he’d been awoken by the alarm the day before, and the one before that as well. He just hadn’t thought about it until now and wasn’t that a horrifying thought. He needed to get up, he needed to go on a run, he needed to make his smoothie, he needed to go to practice.
Fuck, practice. Shane didn’t remember the last time he dreaded going to practice this much. Maybe before he got to the MLH? Or was it before he got chosen for the junior team? He remembers that team being absolute dicks the whole bunch of them. He remembers them all hating them. He’d only been with them for about a year before getting picked for juniors. That had been fun. They had liked him. He wonders if they still would if they knew about him being gay, or about Ilya. He wonders how many of the old friends he still had contact with on occasion would hate him if they knew or had known back then.
He can’t help but wonder how different it would have been if he’d been out that young. He hates thinking about it but still his mind won’t shut up. He needs to get up. He needs to. He looks at his phone again. He doesn’t have the energy. He goes back to bed. Sleeps for another hour and when he wakes up the second time he’s in too much of a rush to think of how his bones feel like they are made out of lead or how it feels like he's moving under water. In the car his phone goes off and Shane debates letting it run out before picking it up. It’s Ilya. He’s not surprised but even so he feels the knot in his stomach tighten trying to come up with an excuse for all the questions his boyfriend is gonna have.
He picks up.
“Hey baby, everything alright? You never replied to my texts?” Shane swallowed thickly and quietly took a deep breath before replying, keeping his voice as normal as possible.
“Hi, sorry I was so tired after the game last night. I fell asleep right as I got home and I overslept this morning. I haven't had the time to check my phone yet. Was it anything important? Is everyone alright?” He knew Ilya wouldn’t be able to tell, Ilya usually bragged about how well he could read Shane and how Shane didn’t know how to lie. What Ilya didn’t know was that most of the time Shane wasn’t trying to lie well. He let him see through it because he didn’t need to lie to Ilya, never really had.
Being able to lie well wasn’t something he took pride in so he never really mentioned it besides it made Ilya so happy so he figured there was no harm keeping the secret. Except now. Now maybe it was a harm, not that Shane saw it that way because he was fine.
The conversation between the two of them didn’t last long and the second Shane hung up Ilya sighed collapsing back into the couch. He had practice that evening rather than morning like Shane so he just sat there staring at the ceiling for a long while. Ilya knew his mental health was complete shit, he was getting better but it was a slow and painful process and he had accepted that. He’d accepted that he needed help, that something was wrong. He’d spent so long knowing something was wrong but just not caring whether it killed him or not that now, when he was starting to live again he wasn’t sure how to do it.
Not only that but something was up with Shane. Something was wrong, he just didn’t know what. Shane was shit at lying and kept saying that he was okay and so on and so forth but even so his gut was telling him something was very very wrong.
He felt like he was going crazy so he got into his car, which wasn’t a strange combination. What was new was the fact that he wasn’t just going for a drive, he actually had a destination in mind. As he drove he let his mind wander, let it run through his latest interactions with Shane.
He had noted the last time they had met up that Shane seemed to have lost weight but now thinking back he wasn’t sure because why would Shane, his beloved boyfriend who had a stricter diet than most of the league and a very well educated nutritionist be losing weight now? So early in the season? It didn’t make sense, he must have been wrong, maybe it had just been exes fat that had been turned to muscle that Ilya hadn't noticed? Or maybe it had just been nothing.
When he pulled into the Hollanders drive way. Yuna was already outside working in the garden. She looked up as he got out and smiled at him before pulling him into a hug and then into the house. He pushed him into a chair and then sat about the kitchen pulling out two mugs and boiling water. Once the tea was ready she sat down across from him and raised an eyebrow at him in concern.
Ilya sighed and took a sip of his tea. David had joined them somewhere along the way and while Ilya wasn’t concerned about it he still couldn’t seem to quiet the voice in his head that didn’t quite trust the older man.
“I feel like I’m going crazy” he began and both of them frowned at him. But stayed silent so he continued. “Something's wrong with Shane, I think, I don't know. I have this horrible gut feeling that something's wrong and it just won’t go away.” Both of them looked worried now.
“Has he said anything? Anything at all that might indicate that something's wrong?” Yuna asked, biting her lip. Ilya sighed again and shook his head.
“No, that's what’s driving me insane. He sounds completely normal! He is such a shit liar that if he lied and said he’s fine I’d know but no! He sounds like normal but he's saying things that aren't. He didn’t text me back for more than 24 hours and he overslept, Shane! Overslept! That never happens and I-”
“Son breath.” Ilya blinked and swallowed harshly. “Good. Now what did you mean Shane is a bad liar?” Ilya frowned at the older man before looking at Yuna who also looked confused somewhere mixed with all the other emotions on her face, the most visible one being worry which didn’t make Ilya feel any better.
“He sucks at lying” he said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world but Yuna and David didn’t seem to agree because they exchanged a loaded look that told Ilya there was something he didn’t know. So he frowned and kept looking between them. “What?”
“Ilya darling, Shane is one of the best liars I know.” Ilya blinked in confusion. Normally such a statement would have made him laugh but it was their seriousness that told him they were one hundred percent serious on the matter so he stayed silent. “Shane once spent three months walking through the snow and missing breakfast because he didn’t want to tell us he lost his buscard. In the end we only found out because one of his friends had told his mother who in turn told us.” Ilya's mouth hung open, he had no idea what to say to that. Then David continued with a sad smile on his face.
“Or that year where he managed to keep it completely quiet he was failing because he didn’t want to disappoint us. That boy can lie scarily well when he wants too and you’d never even notice. Sure he lies badly about things that don't matter, things like you." Ilya looked confused now and David only smiled kindly at him. “You have no idea how many times we have asked about things regarding his love life and he’s been able to keep a completely straight face about it. Even when we asked why he and Rose broke up he didn’t lie that badly. We actually believed him when he said he wanted to go on a silent retreat because that’s how well he can lie when he feels like he needs to.” Ilya was speechless. He had no clue how to feel about the whole thing.
Betrayed? Happy? Sad? He didn’t know and it didn’t help that the knot in his stomach was growing by the second. He felt like he was going to suffocate on it soon if it didn’t stop growing.
“Ilya,” he looked up at Yuna at the sound of his name. She gave him a small smile but there were tears gathering in the corners of her eyes. “I am so happy you think he's a bad liar” Ilya shook his head, tears in his eyes this time as everything got too much.
“No, no, I am awful boyfriend, I didn’t know. I should know this I am-”
“No” Yuna cut him off harshly, she took his face in her hands and wiped the tears away shaking her head. “No, you're an amazing boyfriend to Shane. He never felt the need to lie to you like that. You made him feel safe enough to tell the truth or let you see it when he wasn’t strong enough to say it out loud himself. I am so thankful he's found someone who he can trust like that and someone who loves him enough to let him be honest like that.” Ilya just looked at her bushing slightly at that.
They sat like that for a little while, Ilya calming down and composed himself again before speaking again. “So you think I am not crazy? Something is wrong and he- he doesn’t wanna tell me what?” Yuna and David exchanged another look then they both nodded at him. Ilya nodded back, squaring his shoulders, then Yuna spoke again before Ilya could berate himself in his head again.
“Knowing Shane he probably hasn’t even admitted it to himself.” That made Ilya pause and look at her with a frown.
“What do you mean?” Yuna sighed, shaking her head sadly.
“Shane feels a lot of things and a lot of the time especially as a child he couldn’t explain what it was. Not only that but a lot of the time especially as a child he’d minimise everything that happened to him.” Ilya opened his mouth to ask what she meant but David was quicker.
“He would get mean comments or looks from his classmates and he’d say it wasn’t that bad because at least they didn’t try to hurt him like some others did to some other kid. Or at least he wasn't benched for playing worse than usual; he just got yelled at by the coach. Things like that.” Ilya nodded and was quiet for a moment as he processed the new information. That's when it all fell into place and he felt himself pale at his own realisation.
“Ilya?” He looked up at Yuna and then at David. He felt like he wanted to throw up but he spoke anyway.
“So hypo- fuck you know word, that, Shane would feel like what ever is wrong isn’t that bad because he is still playing hockey with good team and he has good kind family and because his country does not hate him?” Both adults looked at him confused for a bit while nodding slowly.
“Yes but-” She cut herself off as she paled her eyes widening in horror as she looked at Ilya how only nodded sourly.
“Oh” David said softly and Yuna hummed.
“Oh” Ilya repeated back bitterly.