Chapter Text
"Why did you say that?" Shane asks quietly after they've showered and crawled into bed. He can tell Ilya is half asleep already, and he hadn't meant to say anything at all. Anya was asleep on the floor beside the bed, her soft snuffly snores the only noise in the otherwise silent room. The quiet of the house presses in around them like a heavy curtain, like padded walls.
Ilya hums at him, a confused noise. Shane almost doesn't say anything, but Ilya squeezes his side, holding him still instead of pulling him closer.
"Why did you tell Harris that you've loved me since Saskatchewan?" Shane whispers, staring at Ilya's chin until he gets pulled in closer. The hand at the back of his head tightens, and then his face is buried in Ilya's neck.
"Is true, моя любовь (my love)," his husband sighs, ruffling the hair at the crown of his head. "I think I have always loved you." Shane can hear the smile in his voice.
He holds back a flinch. Barely.
He waits until Ilya is asleep to pull free from his arms. He slides to the floor beside Anya, knowing he doesn't have the wherewithal to make it much further than this right now. The dog perks up, sniffing at Shane's knee before hesitantly crawling into his lap, something he rarely allows. When she doesn't encounter any protests or gentle encouragement to direct her attention elsewhere, she settles in comfortably, flopping entirely onto Shane's legs. He scratches absently behind her ears as she falls back asleep. His head thuds against the bed frame as he leans back.
He’s overreacting. He knows he is. And it doesn’t make any fucking sense.This is such a little thing, a nothing detail that he should have brushed off like everything else. Like every other comment Ilya makes about him that he doesn’t like but doesn’t care enough to make a fuss about. But he just has to make a fuss about everything, he always has. He’s gotten better over the years, after bothering his parents again and again, and then Hayden and JJ, and then Ilya, about only making it a big deal to himself. If he can work through his stupid fucking issues before anyone else notices, they aren’t real issues anyway.
And this one certainly isn’t, he tries reasoning with himself. You barely said anything when Ilya implied you tripped on purpose the other day.
To be fair, Hazy, who had been part of the group Ilya had been talking to had shut it down pretty quickly, telling off Barrett and Dykstra for laughing and pulling Ilya to the far end of the rink to have what looked like a fairly heated conversation. Ilya hadn’t said anything to Shane when they’d skated back over to join the larger group, but he’d been quiet for the next few days, sticking close to Shane and shooting complicated glances at their goaltender who seemed to be deliberately ignoring him.
So really, Shane hadn’t had the chance to say anything, even if he could have plucked up the courage (or the will) to do so. It had been handled.
And there was nothing to even handle here. He was just being stupid and neurotic, overthinking little details that his husband used to embellish stories to make them more like a fairytale.
Ilya can't have loved him since Saskatchewan.
Shane knew there was something there, outside that rink in freezing cold Regina (a schoolboy crush, his mind helpfully supplies now).
He knew that something had grown into something real the November before Sochi.
He knew there was no turning back in Vegas.
He knew something had changed in Boston, the rules had been rewritten without him knowing about it, without him understanding.
He finally knew that he loved Ilya when he watched Rose Landry walk away with a smirk, and felt nothing but gratitude and anticipation for Tampa Bay.
If he'd loved Ilya in Saskatchewan, he wouldn't have run in Boston. If he'd loved Ilya in Saskatchewan, he wouldn't have tried to force a relationship with Rose. If he'd love Ilya in Saskatchewan... he might have tried to talk more in Vegas, maybe even Sochi.
If he'd loved Ilya in Saskatchewan, he doesn't think he'd have waited years to...
He feels the tears welling up in his eyes and buries his face in Anya's coat.
Ilya had been exaggerating, putting on a show for his friend, hamming up the story of when they first met. Harris had been a rapt audience, tucked away in a booth at Monk's after a grueling weeknight game that went to overtime.
"He shook my hand again and I fell in love. I belonged to him and only him after that." He'd said it wistfully, squeezing Shane's hand under the table, putting his head on Shane's shoulder. Shane had squeezed back automatically, and had clearly managed to hide the turbulent emotions swirling around in his head, because Harris had just laughed and asked when Ilya had turned into such a loverboy. "Have always been one, Harris. Since Hollander bewitched me with pretty freckles and horrible backhand."
They'd left soon after that, both exhausted and sore. Shane had meant to let it go. He should let it go now.
Ilya was exaggerating. He didn't love him back when they were seventeen. He didn't love him at the first All-Stars, in the room next to Scott Hunter. He didn't love him that warm night in November.
He didn't love him during those silent months after November, that stretched all the way to a hot summer in Vegas.
He didn't love him in Vegas.
He didn't love him sitting on his own couch in Boston, talking about having sex with other people, talking about Svetlana like she was inevitable.
Ilya didn't love Shane in all those bedrooms and bathrooms, and hallways and alleyways, and clubs and bars where loving Shane had to have been the very last thing on his mind.
He would have done things differently if he'd loved Shane way back then.
I would've done things differently, Shane thinks desperately. And so would he. He–We wouldn't have done all those things.
You don’t do those things to people you love.
Right?