Chapter Text
Ilya Rozanov didn’t give a shit about hockey. He didn’t give a shit about what the crowd, his teammates or anyone on the Metros would think. And he for sure didn’t give a shit about the refs trying their best to hold him back from where Shane lay immobile on the ice. By the time the refs gave up the losing battle, Shane was on a gurney being wheeled off the ice by a trio of paramedics.
“Is he okay? Fucking tell me!” Ilya shouted as paramedics ignored him. But his teammates didn’t ignore him. The Metros didn’t ignore him, the fans didn’t ignore him. Everyone was now staring at him like he had made a shocking confession. Like he had just shouted to Shane, “I love you, I’m so in love with you, please, please don’t fucking die!” Which, if he was being honest was what he wanted to say, what he kept himself from saying out loud in English even now.
But they were supposed to be rivals. They were supposed to hate each other. Ilya blew that cover to bits now. He stood on the ice under the scrutiny of all these stares for a few seconds before shouting, “Fucking fuck!” And getting out of the rink as fast as he could.
Once he was out of his skates, Ilya changed into the black jeans and maroon sweater, the outfit he had been planning to wear when he went on an actual date that night. Hotel rooftop picnic at night with a hundred and fifty led candles surrounding them. It was a surprise. He was going to surprise Shane.
But instead of that romantic dinner, he was on the fifth floor of Montreal General arguing with the stone-faced girl running the reception desk.
“I just want to see him, I just want to know he’s okay. See it for myself.”
“Family only, sir,” she said bluntly. “I’m surprised you made it this far actually. Sheila may have bent the rules for you, but I won’t be doing that.”
“You don’t understand, you don’t fucking understand. I need to see him.” Ilya’s heart felt like it was being wrung out like a wet rag.
“I understand you’re upset, Mr. Rozanov but only family can see him now.”
“Is there a problem?” said a woman behind him. Ilya turned to see Yuna, Shane’s mom behind him, looking at him warily.
“I uh…uh,” Ilya couldn’t speak to her for so many, many reasons now.
“Rozanov?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Ilya said, nodding politely, feeling like he was twelve years old in grammar school again.
“What are you doing here?” She said accusatory. Because, right, he and her son were supposed to be rivals, supposed to hate each other’s guts.
“Oh, well, just want to make sure he’s in the clear,” he said with a big smile. But it didn’t reach his eyes. Hell, the smile didn’t even try to reach his eyes because now his eyes were welling the fuck up with tears. And he knew, from the fleeting softness on her face, that Yuna saw it.
“Far from it,” Yuna returned, bitterly, though it clearly wasn’t directed at Ilya.
“He might not play hockey again?” This, Ilya knew, would be the worst thing for Shane. Shane lived and breathed the sport. Whereas Ilya just liked to be the best at whatever he did, Shane fucking loved hockey. Not being able to play professionally would destroy him.
“He might not wake up again,” Yuna snapped.
Ilya’s knees buckled and he would have fallen to the floor if his arms didn’t grab onto the desk. He pulled himself up, but the damage was done. Yuna was now looking at him not with hate or suspicion, but with abject confusion.
“Am I missing something?”
Ilya tried to look away before the first tear fell. “Just didn’t think it was as bad as that. I should go.” But Ilya’s legs felt like lead. His wrung-out heart rioted. He curled his hands into fists so no one could see them shaking.
“Greta, I don’t think you’re aware of this but Mr. Rozanov is actually Shane’s second cousin on his father’s side. So…”
“So, he’s family,” Greta said, rolling her eyes, knowing full well that Ilya and Shane were in fact not cousins.
“He’s family,” Yuna said softly. Ilya could feel her looking at him, clearly noticing the tears, Ilya tried to wipe away discreetly. But Ilya couldn’t look back at her because he just hadn’t expected her to be so kind.
Shane looked so small in the hospital bed, under wires and tubes going to and from his body like strange, terrifying tentacles. Machines beeped and whirred as they gave him drugs, helped him breathe, or just watched and waited, like Ilya.
“So,” Ilya said as he clenched the bedrail, careful not to touch Shane, because a deep-down childish part of him thought it would be bad luck for him to even take his hand. He wasn’t worried about being caught. Not now, not when he was so close to losing Shane. It was more that maybe something in him caused this, caused the people he loved to die. His touch was wrong, his touch was bad and it destroyed the people he loved the most.
The last time he had seen his mother alive, just an hour before she killed herself, Ilya had kissed her on the cheek and she had smiled her beautiful smile and he left to do his homework, thinking she’d be okay after all.
And though he did not touch Shane during the game, he had that same thought. Shane turned back just to smile at him, he was literally the reason Shane turned back. And when Shane smiled, for a half-second, Ilya thought maybe they would be okay after all. This is why it’s better not to hope.
“So,” Ilya began again. “Sorry to say Hollander but you can’t die. You have to come back to me. Your mother and father, your friends, and the ice. You have to come back to all of us. Don’t fucking do this, Hollander. Please.”
He inhaled so sharply his whole body shuddered. “Life is scary. I know it’s scary but I love you so much and I hope that makes it less scary for you, knowing you are so so loved by someone who chose you and who would keep choosing you again and again in every possible fucking scenario. You’re it for me. You’re not just my person, you are my fucking soul. So you see, you can’t go. Sorry to say, but you have to stay here with me. You can’t go, Shane.”
The door creaked softly and Yuna slipped into the room just as quietly. He didn’t know what she heard or if she heard anything. But the look on her face as she took her son’s hand on the opposite side of the bed told her she had heard enough.
“Take his hand, Ilya,” Yuna said almost sternly but Ilya realized almost immediately that it was because she was trying not to cry.
So, at his mother’s request, Ilya took Shane’s hand. It was cold and clammy but soft and smooth. Ilya wanted to say he felt Shane’s fingers curl into his palm, but that was wishful thinking, that stupid hope again.
“I don’t know what the story is between you two,” she said, letting her tears fall in front of him. “I don’t need to know it right now. You and Shane will tell me together when he wakes up. Okay, Ilya?”
Ilya’s chest hurt as he started crying freely. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“Just say okay, sweetheart.”
This made Ilya cry more. It had been so many years since he heard a special name like that, a special sweet name that came from a parent to a child, directed at him. And back then it had come, of course, from his own mother. It hadn’t been the Russian word for sweetheart. But close, she called him solnyshko, little sun.
“Okay,” Ilya whispered softly, looking down at Shane, looking so horrifyingly fragile as the machines beeped and whirred and waited.