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Ilya was all too glad to let Shane drive them back from the cottage to Shane’s place, where they would stay through the end of the Irina Foundation’s training camp in Montreal.
After that, it wouldn’t be Shane’s place anymore, and Ilya’s place would become their home, something both of them had spoken about in hushed, awed voices late at night sometimes, whispering even though they were the only people in the house.
Neither of them let themselves say it too loudly or too frequently, but they had both been dreaming of a future together for so long. Every minute Shane spent in Ottawa had always felt like home; every moment without him, on the alternative, hollow. Then, Ilya felt himself believing more and more that Shane was complacent in hiding - happy, even, when his mind was at its worst.
He had been realizing now that Shane was suffering, too, in Montreal, thinking Ilya was content to sit back and coast through with a mediocre team, while he worked his ass off in Montreal to keep himself afloat.
Even at just 222 km away, the distance had become a loose thread, unraveling every time one of them got on the highway. Both back to isolation.
Ilya had assumed Montreal had been a source of comfort for Shane, but really, in some ways, it had become a chamber of isolation. Montreal had been a fortress for Shane, somewhere private, but not the way the cottage was private. The cottage was a sanctuary of warmth and relaxation and books and Shane. Montreal was an impeccably designed, eternal bachelor pad where he could host his team and look, in the eyes of any other hockey player, normal. It was just lived in enough that it looked like his home and not a model showroom, but never personal enough that anyone felt like they knew anything more about Shane Hollander for having been there.
So many years ago, Ilya dreamed of what his apartment looked like, imagined the color of his sheets and the placement of his floor lamps. He wondered if the walls were white with an eggshell finish, or if Shane had daringly chosen matte paint. Maybe even a satin finish, agreeable gray, if he were really feeling adventurous. He imagined Shane vetoing ugly area rugs and choosing between two nondescript pieces of wall art in a contrasting color.
He wanted to walk into that apartment and feel like, suddenly, he knew Shane.
He had been in their secret apartment countless times, remembered the feel of the flooring - vinyl, for durability - against his bare feet and the masses of pillows and blankets that added neither softness nor warmth to the space, chosen just to make the bed look as bed-like as possible.
He had convinced himself that the personality it was lacking would be found in Shane’s apartment.
And then he was invited into the warm world Shane had created in his cottage. It was still clearly decorated by a professional, but it looked and felt personal. The warm, natural wood panels and plush couches with seats that had clearly been sat in, luxuriated upon on rainy mornings. The sheets on Shane’s bed were blue, like they had been in his imagination, but they were softer than Ilya had realized possible - and Ilya was no stranger to expensive sheets.
He remembered the books with worn spines and dog-eared pages on the shelf, video games that weren’t just MLH, and a surprising amount of movies. Shane asked if he had ever watched Lord of the Rings that first night, and Ilya had laughed when he told Shane it was too much to translate in his head while he watched. The next summer, Ilya had been shocked to find Russian dubs nestled in the shelves, just so Shane could sit quietly and observe while Ilya watched some of his favorite movies. Ilya insisted on seeing whether they could find English subtitles, but Shane just pulled Ilya against his chest and said he didn’t need the words to know what was happening; he’d seen the movies enough.
Shane spent days afterwards thirsting over Aragorn and gushing about his bold leadership and quiet devotion, maintaining that his affinity for the character had nothing to do with his looks, and ew, Ilya, don’t say he was my sexual awakening; I was ten. Ilya just liked the fellowship. He liked seeing different people find a strength and purpose together.
Really, he just liked sitting on a couch that Shane also sat on, watching something Shane watched, and feeling like he was a part of Shane’s life.
After sharing time at the cottage, his apartment in Montreal felt closer to the secret building than it did to a home.
Except, of course, for the trophy room, lined with Shane’s career achievements, serving as the perfect fuck-you to anyone who questioned whether he was the best to play the game.
Presently, Ilya couldn’t fucking wait to bring Shane’s trophies to Ottawa, to their home where they belonged.
He had never hated Montreal, couldn’t bring himself to hate the place, or even really the team, that Shane had built. He had resented the city so many times, with varying degrees of spite, but he always came back to the reality that it was Shane’s home as he grew into adulthood, like Boston had been for Ilya. It carried him through his perfect career. He grew into an undeniable leader and Olympic medalist, all in Montreal.
So, even at his lowest points over the past season, he forced himself to remember that Montreal was everything to Shane. It fell on his priorities somewhere behind, but close, to Ilya and Shane’s parents. At Ilya’s worst, he would have ranked himself behind Montreal, probably. Really, he acted like he knew he was less important than Montreal, and that had just allowed a slow building resentment to build between them, unspoken and misunderstood by both of them, lost in their own heads about what they thought the other was feeling.
He let himself believe that Shane drove back to Montreal excited to get back on the ice after a weekend with Ilya.
What he hadn’t known, hadn’t seen, was that Montreal was also the thing eating Shane alive. That being out there hadn’t been the pressure-release valve Ilya assumed it had been, but rather a continuing pressure building in a vessel where the valve had been broken off years ago.
Ilya had assumed that the team was likely full of Hayden Pikes - a bit irritating, homophobic less in practice and more due to a lifetime of heteronormativity (a word he learned from Harris) - who accepted Shane, but made dramatic gagging sounds at the thought of men kissing. In ‘good fun,’ harmless, so they say, but reinforcing that queerness made Shane different and also worse.
He assumed most hockey players would fall into that category. Accepting, sure, kind of, but because it was someone they knew and respected. Not vocal about their support, not outwardly accepting the idea of queer people in general. Not supportive of inclusion in hockey.
He knew that was special; their work at the Irina Foundation was partially to find the players who cared, because they would be building a generation of locker rooms that went from lukewarm approval to open acceptance. He realized, soberingly, how fucking important that was when he reached out to a few of his friends in Boston, and none of them had wanted to coach at the camps.
What he didn’t anticipate was that the team actually spent the season making sure that Shane knew they thought being gay was not just different, but it was wrong, and it was a weakness.
Ilya had thought Shane was maybe a little overdramatic every time he insisted that their teams would never accept them, again, because he figured they would be neutral at worst, and maybe curious and happy for them at best.
Never did Ilya think that one of the fucking coaches of the Irina Foundation, who was supposedly one of Shane’s best friends, would shred any remaining respect the team had for Shane with one accusation after his other friend had - accidentally, Ilya reminded himself - outed their relationship.
He didn’t expect the Metro’s administration to pull the rug out from under Shane, to lose him in free agency for nothing in return, all because he was engaged to Ilya.
It had been a hard truth to swallow, that Shane had been right. Not only that Montreal wouldn’t accept him, but also that it would impact Shane’s career the way it did.
They were pulling onto Shane’s street when he finally broke the silence. “J.J. wants to talk to me today,” he started, his tone flat, betraying nothing.
Ilya already knew, though, the way the weight of Shane’s friendship with J.J. had been haunting him the entire summer.
“What is there to talk about?” Ilya responded.
Shane sighed, the hand he had on Ilya’s knee gripping a bit. “He said he owes me an apology.”
“Mm. Now that I agree with.”
“Ilya,” Shane admonished.
“No, I am serious. I want to talk to him, too, I think.”
Shane’s eyes widened slightly, glancing over at Ilya. And suddenly, he looked like he did these past few years again. The offseason had been rough, yes, with Shane hurting many days, letting go of the emotions he’d been holding back since coming out. But even in that hurt, there had been a freedom. He didn’t have to se his jaw and let his eyes shine with unshed tears (just moisture, he told Ilya once, not tears).
But many other days, Shane was happy, relaxed in a way he rarely was. They woke up together, settled into their routines, ate, and went to bed together. Shane smiled genuinely enough to make his eyes warm with the emotion of it. He laughed loudly. He continued to let his hair grow out, let Ilya brush it and tie it back for him on lazy mornings.
He stole roasted potatoes off of Ilya’s plate and stuck his tongue out at him before eating them.
He cajoled Ilya into morning yoga, let himself break perfect form when Ilya got antsy or playful.
He moved without the pressure of performance in any way.
He was always less restrained when they were together, and even moreso at the cottage, but this was different entirely. It felt like Shane opening the gates of himself to himself finally. Letting himself experience the liveliness that was always there, just dulled and restrained.
Shane was like a bird whose wings were only just coming back after being clipped: beautiful, but restrained for convenience, learning how to give into his instincts again after years of containment.
Ilya knew that the relaxation wouldn’t last forever. Shane would cut refined carbs by the time camp was over and head into summer training with a stoic determination. Ilya loved that part of him, too. He loved the intensity Shane carried himself with. The way his body seemed to just absorb any external pressures and use it as performance fuel.
He knew those days were coming. He knew driving to Montreal, preparing for camp there, would start to bring some of that tension back. He expected to feel tension knots forming in Shane’s shoulders as he held him over the next week.
After the last five sentences of their conversation, Ilya was reconsidering the timeline on tension. Already, Shane’s shoulders had risen slightly, his jaw clenched.
Maybe Ilya would pry it open, later that night, after J.J. was gone. He could dig his fingers in just to the point of bruising, just until Shane whimpered for him, and then he would reward him for opening so wide.
Maybe he could remove the tension in those shoulders before it set in for the remainder of the summer.
Because he loved Shane’s intensity, but he loved to watch the stress melt away from him.
He wanted their wedding day, happening between both camps, to be a day where Shane was fully relaxed, surrounded by nothing but love.
So he couldn’t let J.J. force Shane to carry unnecessary emotional weight into the rest of the off season.
“I don’t need you to, like, defend my honor or whatever, Ilya. I’m capable of handling this myself,” Shane said.
Ilya squeezed his hand. “I know this. I don’t want to defend you. I want to make sure I am not letting a bigot teach children at a program that is meant to be welcoming.”
“He’s not a bigot, he was just —”
“Please, Shane. Let him tell me himself.” Ilya asked.
Shane was quiet for longer than Ilya expected, as if he really had to weigh the options. It should bother Ilya; it would have bothered him, earlier in the season, with the distance gnawing away at the scraps of his well being. But he understood, now, that J.J. was one of the few people who openly supported Shane, even if he was the first to throw him under the bus and accuse him of falling on purpose.
That bothered Ilya still. It was one thing to be resentful to be left out of your friend’s life, but to throw that friend to the wolves immediately after getting knocked out of the playoffs in the first round was just fucking rank.
The way Ilya saw it, Shane had two friends in Montreal, and neither respected his relationship. Ilya didn’t need to be liked, really. He built an entire career on being disliked, actually, and he loved being an asshole. He was soft around the people he cared about, though not without teasing. He wasn’t going to show that affection to anyone who he found to be undeserving, but it didn’t mean that he had to tolerate Shane being mistreated because other people can’t see past some harmless shit-stirring.
Shane parked in his reserved spot, turning the car off without getting out immediately. He shifted in his seat, turning to look at Ilya. “Fine, yeah. Talk to him. Just -” Shane paused, his face pinched a bit, whether in concentration or stress. “He’s really, really not a bad guy. He was so accepting of me, and I don’t think he dislikes you. Let him actually explain himself.”
“I will be on my best behavior,” Ilya said solemnly.
He would try. That lasted about five minutes when he first met Pike.
Maybe he could afford J.J. ten.
After they had settled in and unpacked, Shane had started pacing around the house with restless anticipation.
It made Ilya wish he had packed more clothes to carry him through the cottage and Montreal’s Irina Foundation camp, if not only for something productive for Shane to take out his nervous energy on.
J.J. wasn’t stopping by for a few hours.
“Shane, my love. I think you should go do some yoga,” he suggested, kindly but not leaving much room for debate.
Yoga and meditation always calmed Shane down, anyway, so he knew it was something that could actually help.
Shane sighed. “I don’t know. It’s not going to help. He’ll be here in like an hour, and —”
Ilya crossed the room, taking both of Shane’s arms in his hands. He gazed at him, the light catching just right against them to set his gorgeous, chocolate eyes aglow, nervous energy pouring out of them. “It will help. I will be here if you need me, but go relax,” he implored.
Shane stared back at him for a moment before taking a deep breath and nodding. “You’re right. Alright, I’ll be in the gym. Just - uh - if J.J. comes before I’m done…”
Ilya nodded, taking Shane’s silence for what it is - the desire for Ilya to step in, to finish his thought so that he didn’t have to. “I will not have him interrupt you. I’ll talk to him first. I’m going to order us takeout. If talking goes well, he can stay for dinner. If it is not so good, I tell him I have special dinner planned for just us.”
He felt Shane’s shoulders drop at that, some of the worry melting away. “I love you so much,” Shane whispered.
“I love you,” Ilya replied, smiling to himself as Shane took one last deep breath, steeling himself before walking towards his home gym.
Ilya hears a knock at the door not even an hour and a half later; J.J. was early, and Ilya knew Shane was nowhere near done whatever yoga and meditation cycle he was using to steady himself before this conversation.
He had known Shane would wait in the gym anyway. He would see J.J. arrive on the camera and hide for a little, safe in his dimly lit cocoon with what Ilya assumed would be binaural beats playing quietly on the surrounding speakers.
Shane puffed up his chest in the car and insisted Ilya didn’t need to defend him, but when given the opportunity for defense, Ilya knew he would take it gladly.
J.J. looks shocked, to say the least, when Ilya opens the door and steps aside to welcome him inside. He stood in the entrance, mouth slightly open.
“You can come in,” Ilya told him.
“I, uh - I’m here to see Hollander,” J.J. responded dumbly, stepping across the threshold like he was entering a lion’s den, and not the apartment he’d been to countless times, that he had the main entrance code to.
“Yes, he is in gym.”
“He doesn’t usually workout at this time. I picked this time because I thought he’d be free.”
Ilya stalked towards the kitchen, hearing J.J. follow behind, his sneakers (which he did not take off despite the shoe tray in the entryway) squeaking on the clean floors. He rolled his eyes at the situation, at J.J. being unable to take that information for what it was.
That maybe Shane would be in the gym because he turned inwards on himself when he was stressed, unleashed everything he was feeling through exertion. One of his best friends should know that. Ilya was pretty sure J.J. does know that. He just hadn’t connected the dots that he was causing Shane stress.
“His schedule is different sometimes in the off season,” Ilya explained, keeping his tone light and friendly. As friendly as he ever really made it around people he wasn’t close to. “Sometimes, he has additional stress to work through.”
“Yeah, I guess it would be hard to have to move to a different city. It’s just Ottawa, though. His parents already live there,” J.J. mused, settling into a chair at the island.
Ilya leveled his gaze at J.J., trying not to look too judgmental. “I do not think the physical move is what is on his mind. His entire life has been torn to shreds, if you forgot. It is the reason you are here, is it not?”
J.J. had the decency to look uncomfortable at that. “I know it’s been hard to Shane. I owe him an apology, and that’s why I’m here. I didn’t even realize you would be here, and I don’t think you and I need to get into it, Rozanov.”
Ilya couldn’t help the face he made that time, so instead he turned to the fridge and grabbed himself a coke, turning around just to hold up the can in offering to J.J., who takes it. Ilya grabbed himself another and stayed on his side of the island, leaning his elbows against it.
“Actually, I think we do.” Ilya said quietly. “For months I am hearing that you are one of the only people in Montreal who accepts Shane. That you might be the only person he’s able to tell about me, someday. He had been planning to, before that fucking video. And then he doesn’t get to tell you anymore, because some idiot online did it instead.”
J.J. assumes that Ilya paused to leave room for response, and not to compose himself.
“It’s not my fault he didn’t tell me,” J.J. argued.
“I am not done. I listen to this for so long. You are one of the Foundation coaches at camp. I am thinking you are this great friend and probably good ally to have in the league. And then my fiance calls me sobbing because you accuse him of tripping on purpose in front of everyone. You don’t reach out to him for weeks, even after the video of the GM talking about Shane like he is nothing. He is not upset about fucking moving in with me. He is upset because there was one person in Montreal who supported him, and you couldn’t even actually do that.”
“He has Hayden, too.”
“Oh, and Pike is such a big supporter of our relationship. That’s why he loved you trying to set Shane up with other men. You did not know, so I am not mad at you for that. You wanted him happy, I thought.”
“I do want him to be happy,” J.J. snapped.
“Then why the fuck would you say that to him?”
J.J. ran his hand through his hair, shaking his head. “Calisse! I did not think I would have to fucking explain myself to you, Rozanov. I was fucking angry that he didn’t tell me. I thought he had a crush on you, you know. I thought he agreed to do the Foundation with you because he thought you were hot and then realized he was in love with someone he could never have. I told him all of that, and he still didn’t tell me. That video…It pissed me off to know he lied to me.”
“Yes, must be very irritating to see your friend’s private life get exposed to the entire world,” Ilya agreed unsympathetically.
“Shut the fuck up, you know it would be hard if one of your friends lied to you.”
“He did not lie. He just,” Ilya pauses, looking down and shaking his head. “He hasn’t had a good time with coming out. His dad walked in on us the first time we got to spend more than three fucking days together. His mom asked if he was throwing games for me. Pike found us out, and he can’t stand me. I don’t give a fuck, but I think it is hard for Shane. Harder for him to carry this than it could ever be for you to not know who your friend is fucking.”
J.J. sighed again. “I know. I know it’s fucking harder for him. That’s why I’m here to apologize. But it doesn’t mean that I have to be happy about it being you.”
“If you are planning to say that to him in your apology, maybe you should fucking save it. He doesn’t need to hear that you don’t like this. It is all he has heard and read all fucking summer.”
“I am not going to say that to him! Jesus you are fucking annoying. What is this? Do you decide who gets to talk to Shane now? Everyone knows about your relationship, and now you’re in charge of him?”
Ilya laughed, humorless and loud. “You know nothing about him, do you? You think he would let anyone else make that decision for him? He comes out, and suddenly you all think he cannot make adult decisions for himself? You think being gay for me has made him useless? Pathetic?”
“That’s not what I said, Rozanov.”
“Is how you sound. Shane will forgive you. I know this. But I don’t have to. And you’re not giving me any reason to right now. We’re all preparing for camp to start on Monday. You think I want you coaching? How am I supposed to think you can coach children when this is how you treat your friend?”
J.J. didn’t speak for awhile after that, and Ilya didn’t push. He could be comfortable in the silence. He pulled out his phone, starting an order from the Thai place closeby. A large pad thai, some salad, some curry, a few of the appetizers that sounded appealing. All things that could be shared, or packed away for another day if this discussion stayed as rancid as it was. He texted Shane, too, telling him to come down once he’s ready. Ilya had enough of this discussion.
It wasn’t that he expected it to go well. It could have gone much worse. He and J.J. had limited interactions, even at previous camps.
He had always been a bit quieter at the Montreal camps, in enemy territory, so to speak, so he didn’t go out of his way to make friends with Shane’s friends. It had been easier to keep the line in the sand as clear as possible.
If Hayden Pike had been able to put it together, J.J. could have seen right through them. Had seen right through Shane. Right equation, wrong solution.
Or whatever.
He’d heard Svetlana say something similar before. She was better at idioms, even after all these years.
“You really care about him,” J.J. said quietly, as if he was having a revelation. He never really understood why people seemed so surprised about that. Ilya realized he had a reputation, but it wasn’t exactly uncommon for hockey players to fuck around for awhile before settling down.
It wasn’t like Shane hadn’t hooked up or dated other people in the beginning, too.
Two other men. Rose Landry. He assumed other women, too, desperate to be normal. Ilya hated thinking about that. Not out of the jealousy that he held towards Rose for so long. Instead, he thought of faceless women Shane had tried to go home with and felt horrible. He thought about J.J. and Hayden high-fiving him as he left the bar, ignorant to the fact that Shane would be burying part of himself to try to perform straightness properly. Would maybe force himself through an orgasm and call it a successful night, convince himself that he could learn to like that. Or he wouldn’t be able to, and he would take it out on himself at practice the next day. The next five days, maybe.
Yes, he cared for Shane. He wanted to cradle Shane in his arms and replace every bad thought he ever had about himself. He wanted to erase every bad night he had with women. Wanted to take away whatever voice in his head told him he should be in bed with a woman, that it would be wrong to be gay. Whether that was his own, or the litany of coaches and players throughout his life.
Ilya shrugged. He wouldn’t be saying all of that to J.J. “Obviously.”
“It’s just really hard for me to not see you as some arrogant asshole.”
Ilya laughed “I am an arrogant asshole. Shane likes that about me.”
J.J. laughed, too. Something in the tension broke. Maybe the common ground of caring about Shane. Ilya had hurt Shane in the past, too. He knew how it felt to be in J.J.’s position. Not that he would admit it.
“He’s hiding from me, isn’t he? There is no way anyone can meditate for that long.”
“I told him I wanted to talk to you first, to see if I still want you as part of a Foundation that is supposed to support inclusivity and promote mental health.”
“And?” J.J. asked, something akin to hopefulness in his tone.
Their conversation could have been worse, all things considered. It wasn’t like J.J. owed Ilya anything. They weren’t the friends trying to repair a fractured relationship.
Ilya shrugged again. “Have not decided yet. Depends on how you speak to Shane.”
He didn’t want J.J. to think he was off the hook already. He wanted him to know that Ilya would be basing his entire opinion on him according to his treatment of Shane from this moment on.
They fell into silence again until Ilya heard footsteps behind him.
“Asseyons-nous dans le salon,” Shane said. Ilya hasn’t really taken to French, but it doesn’t sound like a normal greeting.
“Ça marche,” J.J. replied, and Ilya has heard that one. Sounds good.
They both moved to the living room. Le salon, he figured. Ilya considered that to be a French lesson. Shane would be impressed with him.
Shane would also know he wanted to eavesdrop, which is why he can hear nothing but quiet French in the other room. So instead of getting all of the details of the conversation while it’s happening, he sat at the island playing Candy Crush. He had told Shane at the cottage they should never open a joint bank account. He didn’t want Shane to see how much money he’d spent on his games.
It wasn’t his fault the levels were impossible to beat.
He lost track of time until Shane walked back into the room, holding the bag of takeout that must have come while they were talking. J.J. trailed behind him. Both of their eyes were red, but neither of them had yelled at any point, and neither of them seemed miserable.
“Всё хорошо?” Ilya asked. All good?
Shane gave a small smile. “да.”
Take that, J.J. Shane can speak a different language with him, too.
Ilya looked behind Shane. “You like Thai food?”
“I fucking love Thai food.”
“Stay. I will grab you a plate.”