Chapter Text
Yuna was not going to call her son a dumbass.
Shane had sat across from her and David, still visibly tense and sneaking looks at Ilya every few sentences, earnestly stumbling through an explanation of his plan to move Ilya to Ottawa and hide their love for the next ten years. He’d tried, he really had, but he was also scared, and that fear was clouding his judgment. His plan was stupid, and it was never going to work.
Fortunately, he had Yuna on his side. She managed to make her way through most of her pasta before she couldn’t help it anymore. She set down her fork and folded her hands on the table, schooling her features.
“Boys, I appreciate the thought you’ve put into this so far,” she said. “But there’s no way you're hiding this for ten years. It is going to leak. We need an actual reasonable plan for you to come out safely and be happy so you can do this on your own terms and not be miserable.”
Shane’s eyes went wide, and he shook his head, darting another look at Ilya. “But we’ve managed to keep it a secret for seven years!”
Yuna raised her eyebrows. “Yes, seven years when you were…”
Shane grimaced. “Please don’t say that word again.”
“Casual?” Ilya offered.
Yuna’s mouth twisted into a little amused smirk. “Yes, it worked while you were casual, only seeing each other six times a year, and seeing other people in the meantime to distract from what was going on. I assume you won’t be seeing other people anymore?”
Maybe that wasn’t a safe assumption with ladies’ man Ilya Rozanov at the table. Only, he quickly shook his head.
“No. Just us,” Ilya hurried to answer, reaching out to squeeze the back of Shane’s neck and rub at the tension there. Shane closed his eyes briefly and nodded.
“Yeah. Just us,” he agreed.
“Well, then it’s going to become obvious really quickly that you both have a partner you refuse to talk about for mysterious reasons,” Yuna said frankly. “I think you can keep that up for maybe a year tops without facing serious questions and speculation, first in the locker room, and then eventually from the media. You more than Shane, Ilya, since Shane isn’t really known for being seen out with people.”
Shane tipped his chin to his chest and blew out a harsh breath through his nose, reaching over to lay a hand on Ilya’s thigh. When he looked back up, his eyes were shiny.
“Then what do we do?” he asked, his voice rough. “Is this… impossible?”
Yuna’s eyes softened. Hockey had asked so much of him already, shoving him into the mold of the perfect golden boy—and granted, part of that was on her—while forcing him to endure the baked-in racism and homophobia of North America’s most conservative sport. Yuna was fully aware that she barely knew the half of what Shane had gone through in locker rooms growing up. For him to sacrifice something of this magnitude on top of the rest… no. Yuna could not abide it.
“Of course it’s not impossible, Shane,” she said gently. “We just need a better plan. David, can you clear the table? I’ll be right back.”
“Of course,” David said, standing to collect the plates with a wink. “Don’t worry, boys. Mom’s on the case.”
Yuna got up, grabbed her laptop from the coffee table in the living room, and started typing one-handed as she walked back to the dining table. Once she was seated again, the bullet points flowed from her fingertips, the skeleton of a plan that would actually work spilling forth.
“Mom,” Shane began, but Yuna held up a finger, tapping out a few more quick notes before leaning back to study her work.
“Okay, the way I see it we have six steps,” she said. “I’m sort of thinking out loud here. I’ll have a more detailed plan once I have time to really go through it, but these are my initial thoughts. Just hear me out, okay?”
Ilya pressed his lips together as if containing a laugh, his cheeks growing pink.
“You are so like her,” he said, nudging his shoulder against Shane’s. “I love it. This is great. Please, I would love to hear your plan. Especially since I did not have to wake up at three in the morning to hear it.”
Shane gave a gusty, dramatic sigh, and Ilya did laugh that time.
“Asshole,” Shane grumbled, elbowing Ilya in the side. “Fine. Let’s hear it.”
Yuna bit back her smile and turned to Ilya.
“The way I see it, the top obstacle here is your citizenship and safety, Ilya, but I think we can get you Canadian permanent residency in about a year,” she said.
Shane sputtered. “A year? What? How? He still plays for Boston!”
“And I suggest you change that sooner rather than later,” Yuna said matter-of-factly. “I think you can get to Ottawa in time for the start of the new season, Ilya, if your contract is structured similarly to Shane’s. You just completed seven years in the league at the end of last season, so I assume your agent negotiated for a no-trade clause to kick in this summer?”
“He did,” Ilya said. “Maybe the only good thing he’s done.”
“Great, that’s great,” Yuna said, typing furiously below her first bullet point. “That’ll be relevant in a minute. So here’s the thing. If you wait and sign with Ottawa next summer when you’re a free agent, Boston gets absolutely nothing in exchange for you. Not a great feeling for the team that drafted and developed you. I know you said you have no loyalty to them, but—”
“Mom,” Shane snapped.
Ilya winced, glancing down at his vodka glass, which he nudged back and forth between two fingers. “Yes. It will not feel good to leave them like that. I have loved Boston, and they have given me a lot. I want to do right by them.”
Yuna smiled. “So, you do that. You make it clear to Boston that you do not intend to re-sign before your free agency, you request a trade in time for the new season, and you tell them you’ll waive your NTC only for Ottawa. Then, Boston gets something in exchange for you. Ottawa will have some prime draft picks to offer, considering how bad they are. I can think of a few active players who might make for good trades, and maybe they have some prospects they could throw in, I don’t know. Better that Boston gets something than nothing, though. They’ll see that.”
“And my NTC is there to protect me in case something goes wrong,” Ilya said, nodding along thoughtfully.
“Yes,” Yuna said, pointing at Ilya. “Exactly. It's possible they’ll try to harass you into waiving for a different team once they know you’re leaving, but I doubt it’ll come to that. The Centaurs will be very motivated to put together a good package for them, and Boston ultimately can’t force you to take anything else with the NTC in place. You don’t seem to like your agent very much. Are you open to signing with someone new?”
Ilya made a face. “Yes, I need to. My agent is Russian. Obviously not going to be helpful with all this.”
Yuna shot him a sympathetic look even as her fingers flew across the keyboard, adding notes about the agent situation. “I’ll get you a list of Canadian agents to consider, but it might be easiest if you sign with Shane’s agent and tell her about your relationship.”
Shane looked like he wanted to protest for a moment, then closed his mouth and shook his head, his eyes falling shut. After a breath, he asked: “How does all this end up getting Ilya permanent residency in a year?”
“Express Entry,” David chimed in from the kitchen over the clank of plates being loaded into the dishwasher.
“Exactly,” Yuna said, bringing up the website for the program and skimming as she spoke. “Ilya, if you got the trade, you’d be a skilled worker at the top of your field with a work contract in Canada. You’d be a shoo-in for the Express Entry program, and once you get everything submitted, it says that most applications are reviewed within six months. We could hire someone to guide you through the process, or the MLH might even have someone. You’ll have to take an English test, but I’m sure that’ll be fine.”
Ilya gave a little half-smile. “I was good in school. I’m sure I can study and pass.”
“You were?” Shane said, his eyebrows raised. “I was awful. My hockey IQ definitely did not translate to high school chemistry.”
“You weren’t that bad,” David said, wiping his hands on a dish towel as he rejoined the table. “You just didn’t care about anything but hockey and it showed.”
“So, are we okay with this plan?” Yuna asked, getting them back on track. “How do you feel about coming to Ottawa this season?”
Ilya went quiet, tracing one finger over the tabletop as he thought. “It is a good plan. It is also a very sudden change. I did not exit the playoffs last year thinking I had just played my last game with Boston. It will take me a bit to get used to the idea.”
“It’s fine if you need to think about it,” Shane said, squeezing Ilya’s thigh. “It’s big. And really fast.”
“And it’s also only one option, though I think it’s the most straightforward and secure,” Yuna said. “We can discuss other paths to permanent residency…”
“Well—” Ilya began.
Shane’s expression turned swiftly murderous. His head whipped to the side to glare at Ilya and he withdrew his hand from Ilya’s thigh, folding his arms over his chest. “If you suggest marrying Svetlana again I will throw your dead body in the lake and no one will ever find it.”
“Shane!” Yuna admonished, immediately thrown for a loop. Shane’s death glare did not waver. She was clearly missing something. “Ilya, who’s Svetlana? What…?”
“Ilya thought it would be a great idea to pitch a green card marriage to his childhood best friend as a way to get a new passport,” Shane spat.
Everyone turned to look at Ilya.
“It is logical!” he protested. “She is American citizen!”
“Why the fuck would you marry her when I’m right here?” Shane seethed. “If you’re marrying anyone, it’s me, Rozanov. Fuck Svetlana.”
After a beat, he added: “No offense, I’m sure she’s great or whatever.”
Ilya’s eyes were wide. “I… did not want to assume—”
“Well, you can fucking assume,” Shane cut in. “If we’re really in this, then you aren’t marrying anyone but me.”
“Okay,” Ilya quickly agreed.
“Okay?”
“Okay, yes. Of course,” Ilya insisted. “We just had not said 'I love you' yet when I said that. I never thought you would…”
“I would. I will,” Shane said, taking his hand on the tabletop. “One day, when we can.”
Ilya gave a tiny nod, his eyes shiny. “Okay.”
Yuna blinked away the sudden burn behind her eyes and cleared her throat. “Well, I will put down marriage as one of our options, then, though it’s not a quick fix. Getting permanent residency that way is slower, and I certainly don’t want to rush you into something before you’re ready.”
Ilya laughed, then looked stricken at Yuna’s offended huff.
“Sorry, no, no,” he said. “It’s just the idea of rushing after we have been at this for seven years struck me as funny. But I know what you mean. When we get married, I want it to be because we are both ready and it is what we want, not because I need citizenship.”
He turned to address the latter part to Shane, who squeezed his hand and had such a stunned, lovesick sort of expression on his face that Yuna had to look away. These boys really were in this, and it made her feel an overwhelming swell of conflicting things to see it. Her baby, in love, talking about marriage, with Ilya Rozanov, and they had the whole world arrayed against them.
Well, that she could do something about. She cleared her throat and scrolled down to her second bullet point.
“Take some time and think about the trade option, Ilya,” she said, proud at how level she managed to make her voice sound. “Getting you permanent residency is the most complicated step, but it’s still only step one.”
Shane looked visibly exhausted at the idea of more, but Ilya leaned in. “Yes, I would love to hear the rest.”
Yuna smiled at him. Damn it, she could feel herself being won over more and more by the minute. A Boston player. She mentally shrugged it off.
“Step two is to assemble your team,” she said. “You need to build a network of trusted friends who know about this secret and can support you.”
“Tell people?” Shane yelped, immediately withdrawing his hand from Ilya and folding his arms over his chest. A second panic was imminent unless she could redirect.
“It will keep you safer, Shane,” she said, keeping her voice level and soothing. “You’re less likely to get desperate and do something stupid if you have a friend you can talk to, like a pressure release valve. It’ll also help for you to have someone in the locker room who can cover for you. You could tell Hayden, couldn’t you?”
“Oh my god,” Shane moaned, tipping his head back and covering his face with both hands. “Hayden is going to lose his shit over this.”
“Hayden does not like me very much,” Ilya admitted with a shrug.
“Well, he only knows you on the ice,” David said.
“Exactly,” Yuna agreed, unable to believe the words she was about to say. “I didn’t like you either when that was my only experience of you, and that was without ever being on the receiving end of your shit talk. Now I know better.”
Yuna was immediately glad she’d said it as Ilya glanced down at the table with a wobbly smile, his cheeks tinged faintly pink. She moved on, giving him a moment to recover. “I have some thoughts about how to tell everyone, and how to make sure they’ll be good allies who won’t fuck this up for you. I want you each to think of who you’d want to tell, at least two to three people. Now, step three: We hard launch your friendship.”
“What exactly does that mean?” Shane said, suspicious.
“It means we let the public know you’re friends who hang out, leaning on the All-Stars narrative if necessary, though I'd rather stay vague. We post pictures to Instagram, mostly with other people involved at first, but then eventually with just the two of you. You let yourselves be seen out together occasionally, get the public used to seeing you together. And you go ahead and start the foundation you talked about. That was a good idea, Shane, and you should definitely do it ASAP.”
The praise seemed to chase a bit of the vaguely ill look from Shane’s face. Too bad he wasn’t going to like the next bit very much.
“Step four is really focused on you, Shane. We need to work on your branding and media training,” she said, making careful eye contact as she spoke. “The ‘whole perfect Canadian hockey prince’ thing needs to go. We need to reframe into ‘confident, secure gay man who just wants to talk about hockey and does not give a fuck what you think.’ It’ll help you in media scrums and in the locker room.”
“You want me to come out,” Shane said flatly.
“Eventually, yes,” she admitted. “Ilya can’t until he has residency, so it’s on you to start slowly moving the public toward the possibility of you two being together. And, truthfully, there have always been vague rumblings about you. Dating Rose helped—”
Ilya scowled, his nose giving an irritated twitch. Yuna fought down a laugh and pressed on.
“—but I think it might be for the best to just get the truth out there, so you can't be outed,” she said. “We don’t start there, though, if you don’t want to. We start with changing the way you interact with the media to present a more authentic image, a bit more of your actual personality. We give you the tools to solidly shut down homophobes in any situation and keep the focus on your playing.”
“For what it’s worth, I think ‘confident gay man who doesn’t give a fuck’ would really suit you,” Ilya said.
Shane groaned and buried his face in his folded arms on the table. “Can we all please stop saying ‘gay man’ over and over?”
Oh, Shane.
Yuna pressed her lips together and tipped her head to one side. “Maybe the first thing we need to do is to get you a little more comfortable with yourself. You literally apologized to me for being gay earlier.”
Ilya’s expression did something complicated and sad, and he reached over to run a soothing hand up and down Shane’s back.
“Maybe we move on and talk about step five for now?” he suggested.
Yuna nodded, but left herself a note under step four about maybe finding Shane a therapist.
“Okay, step five,” she said, scrolling down. “We start to soft launch the relationship and further intertwine your public images. Joint ad campaigns. More Instagram posts with just the two of you. Avoidance instead of denial. Have you seen with some of the married PWHL players, who you should really know and support anyway. If Ilya has his PR by this point, then maybe he comes out too.”
Shane lifted his head off the table and fixed Yuna with an exhausted look. “What’s even left for step six?”
“Confirm the relationship,” Yuna said softly. “Make it official. Whether it’s something formal like a statement or an interview, or something casual like an off-the-cuff confirmation during media. Or you just stop hiding and let yourselves be seen. However you want.”
Shane’s next few breaths were labored. He shook his head, staring off into the distance with his mouth pressed thin. “Mom, we can’t. Our careers will be over if we come out. Scott Hunter was one thing, but two rival players together... the league will kick us out.”
“They will not,” Yuna said with pure confidence punctuated by lightning fast keystrokes. “For one, it’s illegal. So obviously illegal they can’t talk their way around it. Two, if they try to question your integrity, all your stats and awards are right there. They can try it, but the evidence won’t pan out. Three, the precedent has already been set in women’s sports. Hell, the C and the A for the Montreal Victoire are married and on the same line. And there’s those women who were on rival Olympic teams—Finland and Sweden maybe?—and they also play for Ottawa and Montreal, just like you want to do. All you have to do is say that publicly and the league can’t contradict without looking like the raging misogynists they are.”
Yuna could see the wheels turning in Shane’s head. “Okay, but they can still make our lives hell, right?”
Yuna pushed her laptop away and folded her arms, studying her son carefully. “Pick your flavor of hell. Hiding is no picnic either. Are you willing to put up with some discomfort to have the relationship you want?”
Her eyes slid over to Ilya to see his reaction to the question, only for her heart to give a painful ache. He looked… resigned. His gaze rested gently on Shane’s profile, soft and aching, and something fierce and protective rose within Yuna.
He didn’t expect to be chosen.
She looked back to Shane, primed to reiterate her points, only to find him already wide-eyed and protesting.
“Wha—of course, Mom. Of course I am.”
But was he just saying that? Was he truly ready to deal with what was to come if they chose to walk this path?
“I’m not saying it’s going to be an easy road,” Yuna said. “I’m saying you have to decide if it’s worth it for this relationship. If you're waiting for a cake walk, it'll never come. What are you willing to do to be together? You were willing to commit to hiding for ten years with the threat of getting outed hanging over your head the entire time. Are you willing to deal with what it means to live in the light instead?”
Shane was silent for a long moment, and Yuna’s stomach clenched. Was she about to witness her son breaking Ilya’s heart? Was he ultimately just too scared and self-loathing to be true to himself in public? And what did that say about her as a parent if he felt that way?
Shane looked over to Ilya and reached out to take his hand.
“I’m willing to do whatever it takes to be together,” he said. “What are you feeling? It’s okay no matter what.”
Yuna breathed a tiny sigh of relief that she had, at the end of the day, managed to raise a son who could choose that sort of bravery. She didn’t miss the similar sagging relief from Ilya. He huffed a tiny laugh, his eyes soft as his smile grew.
“You already know what I think,” he said. “I want to be with you. Whatever it takes.”
Yuna smiled, shooting a glance at David, who sat back with his arms crossed, looking pleased. He raised his eyebrows at her and mouthed “good job.” She reached under the table to pinch his thigh, then went back to her laptop, making a few last notes.
“So? What do we think of this plan overall? Are you on board?” she asked, breaking the boys out of their lovey-dovey staring contest. Shane nodded, throwing his arm across the back of Ilya’s chair.
“In general, yeah, but I think maybe Ilya should sleep on it,” he said. “The trade part, at least.”
“Sleep on it?” Ilya asked, brows furrowed.
“Like, take tonight to think about it, get some sleep, then see how you feel in the morning,” Shane clarified. “Or longer, if you need. Asking for a trade is a big deal, and it’s your choice if you want to do it now or wait to sign in free agency. It’s your career. I want to make sure you feel good about whatever you decide.”
Ilya nodded, reaching over to squeeze Shane’s thigh. “Ah, yes. That makes sense. I will do that. I think I already know what I want, but it makes sense to sleep on it, as you say.”
“Great,” Yuna said with the air of adjourning a meeting. “In that case, I’ll take tonight to firm this up and turn it into something that can be shared with Farah once we bring her into the loop. I’ll see if she’s available for a meeting tomorrow.”
Shane blew out a slow breath and dropped his chin to his chest. Ilya gave his leg a little shake.
“Too fast?” he asked.
Shane shook his head. “No, no. I mean, yeah, kinda, but I’ll be fine. It needs to be done. I’m gonna freak out a little bit at every new thing, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not committed to this. Okay?”
“Okay,” Ilya said gently, leaning in for a quick peck. Yuna’s heart gave a warm little thrum. Damn it, she liked Ilya Rozanov for her son. They were good together. And they needed her. Yuna was going to do everything in her power to make sure these boys got the future they deserved.
“Okay, then, boys,” she said. “How about we meet for breakfast in the morning and talk more then?”
Shane looked to Ilya for confirmation, then nodded. “Sure. Why don’t you come over to our place? We’ll cook. Just… text before you come.”
Yuna waved that away. “Why don’t we just say we’ll come around eight thirty?”
“Please text first,” Ilya reiterated.
“We’ll text,” David said with odd emphasis, putting an arm around Yuna’s shoulders and shooting her a look.
Oh. Right. Okay.
“Well. We’ll… see you then,” she said in an awkward, stilted cadence. “We’ll just… walk you guys out.”
It was a good thing she had hours of planning and contingency making ahead of her. She did not want to think too hard about why it was so important to text.
The next morning, Yuna texted not once, not twice, but three times at David’s behest before heading over to Shane’s cottage, a bowl of freshly cut fruit perched atop the laptop bag in her lap. Once they pulled up beside Shane’s Jeep and got up to the front door, they knocked loudly before letting themselves in. Voices drifted from the kitchen.
“If you need to think longer, it’s okay,” Shane was saying. As Yuna walked into the room, she saw them standing close, Ilya’s hands on Shane’s hips and Shane’s arms thrown over Ilya’s shoulders, one hand tangled in those riotous curls.
“No, no, I am sure.” Ilya looked up and met Yuna’s eyes as she entered. “Good morning.”
“Morning, boys,” David said, setting the fruit bowl down on the table. “Sounds like you’ve been busy already.”
“We have,” Ilya said, stepping back and taking Shane’s hand. He took a steadying breath and then nodded once. “I want the Ottawa trade.”
The words hung in the air, heavy with significance. Step one. A huge step, the biggest of them all except perhaps the final one. Ilya was entrusting Yuna with his career, his safety, his life.
She would not let him down.
“Okay, then,” Yuna said, setting down her laptop bag and unzipping it. “Let’s get to work.”
Hopefully these boys really were all in, because things were about to start moving fast.