Chapter Text
Vegas, June 2014
The edges of the picture had begun to bend; Shane was like a firework on the very verge of a convulsive explosion. The skirting of the doorway and the hand there gripping it were each as white as the other, and although the phone in his pocket rang and rang Shane made no move to answer it. It had been ringing since he’d last been an idiot, around seventeen minutes ago- when he had sent that stupid fucking message to Ilya Rozanov: “We didn’t even kiss”.
You fucked up freak.
His mind raced itself down a long corridor, within which every surface was black, and the floor felt sticky. There was a torrid taste in his mouth and tightly wrapped beneath his spare fingers was a bottle of vodka from the hotel's mini fridge. It went entirely against every facet of his being to drink to excess, but the bottle was already a third empty, and a heat was spreading up through his sternum.
What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, he thought miserably, although already settling like stones in the grooves of his hips were the ghostly hands of his arch rival. Their fingerprints seemed to have left indents in his skin that he could feel as depressions beneath his smart trousers. He was certain that they at least would follow him far from here, even if the vodka managed to flush out the rest of tonight’s memories. Thinking sickly of the last few hours, and of those hands, and of that room, Shane could only desperately crave Canada and the twin-sized bed in his parent’s home, the surrounding walls plastered with trophy display shelves and certificates. But he was not at home, and he was staring through the darkness at a king-sized bed, and the walls were bare and plain. Somewhere in the throng of the cityscape, his teammates were out partying, but Shane had forgone their company for Rozanov’s dark eyes and broad shoulders, and where had that left him?
We didn’t even kiss.
Jesus Christ. He thought, vision tunnelling as he lifted the bottle again to his mouth, and drank from it numbly. Rozanov doesn’t talk to me for six months and then we fuck and I expect a kiss? Class fucking clown, Shane. Grade A fucking idiot.
He started forwards, still drinking, and stumbled sideways into a desk, knocking his wallet and keys off its surface. When was the last time he’d drunk alcohol? He’d already had some of Rozanov's. He stared down at the floor, unseeing, coughing thickly as the vodka swam down his throat. He could not recall the last time that he had eaten; these days, he rarely could. The vodka had nothing within which to seep but Shane’s own marrow, and it was settling inside of him like oil on water. His phone rang again but his limbs were molasses and he could not force himself to answer it, to read the name at the top of the call-screen.
Instead, he slouched over to the window and slid down its cold pane. The room was still dark, and he sat, crowded against the glass, on the floor, for a very long time. All the while he was sipping the vodka, and with every minute that passed the world span faster and faster, and the heat in his stomach moved to warm the expanse of his torso and throat. Cotton wool seemed to have begun growing out of his ears, so dampened had become the quiet of his room. At some point he threw up, right into his own lap, and at some point, his phone stopped ringing.
Eventually he became aware of the knocking. An hour or two at least must have gone by since he had left Rozanov's room, but time itself was twisting, becoming a part of the furniture. It was, however, no more solid than he was, and he was paper thin, shuddering against the backdrop of Las Vegas’s millions of blinking lights. Shane had thought that the city looked pretty from Rozanov’s window, but from his own room, it was an alien world, full of people and things he did not understand.
“Fucking shut up?!” He groaned, almost to himself, when the knocking had not ceased, but in fact, grown more insistent after a few more minutes. He moved to take another sip of his vodka but the bottle was not in his hand. When he’d been sick he must have dropped it, and whatever had been left inside of it was now soaking rapidly into the carpet by the sole of his right shoe.
“Hollander? Open the fucking door.” The disembodied voice startled Shane so much that he physically jumped. The intensity of its tone seemed to tear the very bile from Shane’s teeth and he theorised quickly that he must be ill; that he was so ill in fact, that he was inventing the sound of Ilya Rozanov's familiar voice. Shane began to cry, and kicked at the bottle. It flew across the room and fractured into a shocking amount of pieces on the leg of a nearby chair. The knocking started up once more, even more furiously, permeated by Rozanov asking Shane to, “Open the fucking door please!”
“Go away!” Shane moaned into his hands. “Fucking go away!”. If by some insane chance, Rozanov really was behind that door, Shane definitely didn’t want to be seen by him like this.
“Open the door in the next minute or I go to reception and get key myself!” Rozanov threatened, his voice a clap of thunder. Shane’s throat tightened and his breaths came faster. His skin felt as though it had melted onto his bones and every clothed part of him itched obscenely. He was struck by the sudden urge to take his shirt off, and he began fiddling with the buttons; his fingers felt thick. Inside his head, in the black corridor through which his mind was still racing, he veered suddenly round a corner. A single thought sat there at the forefront of his brain.
I need help.
Shane needed someone to help him, because he could not do this right now. He could not be the big tough strong fucking man he was supposed to be. He couldn’t handle Rozanov’s indifference, he couldn’t handle himself. He found himself suddenly upright and halfway across the room, shirt billowing, fingers palming the bed's duvet as he passed it, both mindlessly and for balance. When he reached the door, he missed the handle twice, but finally, he grabbed hold of it and yanked the door open wide. Rozanov really was there, in joggers and a white tee shirt, his shoulders heaving as though he’d recently completed a long run. His large hand was still raised as though ready to beat down the door. He was sweating, his forehead shining in the bright hallway light.
Shane cringed away from him, leaning inadvertently into the door. It swung on its hinges and hit the wall with a loud smack, dragging Shane with it. He crumpled to the floor and even Rozanov, star and captain of the Boston Raiders, wasn't fast enough to stop him from falling.
“Fuck!” Rozanov exhaled, surprised, as he shot forwards through the doorway and almost barrelled the both of them over in his attempts to keep Shane from a complete wipe-out. They stayed like that for a strange moment, their eyes locked, Rozanov’s hands under Shane’s armpits. Rozanov's mouth was ajar, as though the words he’d been preparing himself to say had deserted him. Shane could feel a pressure building in between his eyes, brought on, undoubtedly, from all the abrupt movement and he squinted. The room was moving. Rozanov had four faces, six. Shane felt himself go limp in his strong arms, head flopping uselessly into the crux of the other man’s elbow. Rozanov did not look angry, as Shane had been certain he had when the door had first opened. He seemed in a daze, flush with confusion and concern. Shane felt abject misery stirring in his chest. He hated this. He hated himself. He hated everything.
Six months. Six years.
He whined and the sound of it seemed to spur Rozanov into action. He dragged Shane far enough into the room to turn and shove the door closed behind them with his foot. Shane followed the dizzying line of his ankle as it emerged from the cuff of his trousers. He wasn’t wearing socks.
“What the fuck is this, Hollander?” Rozanov hissed, his voice strained. He’d gotten one arm underneath Shane’s knees and was hoisting him up into the air with a herculean strength. Something dribbled down the side of Shane’s chin and he tasted vomit again on his tongue. He threw up suddenly and it was a testament to how much good-will Rozanov actually had, because he didn’t drop him, even when regurgitated vodka slid over the toes of his trainers.
“I’m sorry,” croaked Shane, and he really was. Rozanov set him down gently on the bed, the muscles in his arms flexing. He stood over Shane for a moment, tall and imposing, just looking at him, and then his eye caught the glint of the smashed bottle on the floor, alongside Shane’s keys and wallet, and his cheeks depressed as though he was biting them.
“Do not- fuck. Did you- you drank?” Rozanov gestured vaguely at the carpet. Shane managed to sit up, but though his eyes followed the movement, he couldn’t focus. Everything that wasn’t immediately in front of him seemed to be stuck in a constant motion blur. “Did you drink all of it?” Rozanov's accent was thick.
He’s upset, Shane thought dumbly, but he made no attempt to reply. He couldn’t seem to think of any words.
“Hollander, did you drink all of it?” Rozanov was crouching down now, his hands on both of Shane’s knees. Shane stared at him through blurry eyes and then shook his head slowly. He began to breathe in deeply through his nose as nausea suddenly clamped around his stomach. He gripped Rozanov's hands weakly with one of his own, and jammed his teeth together. He could feel himself shaking. Rozanov's face came slowly into focus and his eyes were black in the dark room. He was also breathing heavily, squeezing Shane’s fingers. His hair was, as usual, curly but it was also unsettled, as it had been when Shane had last seen him. How far away that moment now seemed. His face was pale, a frothy grey, and his lips were parted and white. “Breathe, Hollander!” He said after a few moments. “Breathe Shane. Come on. Breathe for me. Breathe slowly.”
Shane hardly registered the use of his first name. He just held on tightly to Rozanov’s hand and did as he’d been instructed. After an unknown length of time his shoulders slumped and he shuddered. “Fucking shit,” he whimpered. “Fucking- I’m so sorry. I’m so-“
“Shhhh.” Rozanov interrupted, bringing his other hand up to cup Shane’s cheek. It must have been covered in sick and saliva and tears but Rozanov didn’t seem to mind. Shane pushed his face into those long fingers and let them caress the space between his eye and his hairline until he felt as though he was on the precipice of sleep. He must have begun to lull forwards because Rozanov gave his cheek a soft squeeze and pulled back. Although he couldn’t quite understand why, Shane knew in the depths of his heart that a line had now been crossed that had nothing to do with the threshold of his hotel room.
“You need shower. I think me too. I have sick on me, and I need to make sure you don’t fall.” His words made little sense to Shane besides the fact that he’d said them. Ilya Rozanov is in my room. He didn’t kiss me but he’s in my room. He came to find me.
“Okay,” Shane nodded, voice cracking. He felt like a little boy.
Rozanov managed to get him up, and steered Shane on his wobbly legs towards the bathroom, taking as wide a berth as was possible around the glass on the carpet. He sat Shane down on the closed lid of the toilet and released him to turn on the lights and the shower. Blinking, half blind round the curve of his back, Shane caught sight of himself in the mirror and almost tumbled off the toilet in shock. He looked devastated. His tanned skin was ashen and oily, he'd sweated through his dress shirt, and thrown up on his trousers. There was an orange hue to his lips and the same colour followed the curve of his mouth down to his chin; vomit. His hair was a wild spasm of black and his eyes were blown out and rimmed with red.
Rozanov returned and leaned backwards on the sink’s cabinet, blocking Shane’s view of the mirror. He was so tall. Shane’s mouth felt dry. “Yes, you look like shit Hollander."
“Don’t- don’t fucking look at me like that!” Shane felt the rough humiliation in his voice, his hackles raising like an animal’s.
“Like what?” Rozanov shrugged, “Like you are going to fall over again? Like you are going to throw up on my feet again? Like what, Hollander?"
Shane swallowed and his throat felt constricted. The edge of the toilet seat was both a long way away and also digging into his thighs. He dragged a sticky hand down his face. “Like you care!” He choked out at last. “Like you actually fucking give a fuck!”
Rozanov snorted and simply moved to help Shane up again. He propped him wordlessly against the sink and began to take off his shoes and socks, then his shirt, then his belt. At last came Shane’s trousers and briefs. Shane just let him, raising each foot clumsily when Rozanov reached the trouser cuff. When he was stood there, entirely nude, and as vulnerable as he had ever been in his life, Rozanov just hugged him. He grasped the back of Shane’s neck with one hand, and held Shane’s torso against his own with the other. His stubble scraped the side of Shane’s ear and chest to chest as they were, Shane could feel Rozanov’s every breath as it inflated his lungs.
“I fucking care.” Rozanov said curtly, into Shane’s hair. Then he let Shane go again, and took him by the hand, leading him towards the shower. Shane had not heard him turn it on, or fiddle with the temperature. He sank into its embrace however when he tripped into the wide tray, catching himself against the opposite wall. Apparently sure enough that Shane wouldn’t find a way to kill himself in the next five seconds, Rozanov dropped his arm again and stripped out of his own clothes. Through his drunken haze Shane noticed that socks had not been the only thing that the Russian had neglected to put on that night.
“You came commando?”
Rozanov rolled his eyes and shoved Shane’s head underneath the spray. He got into the shower, “Technically I always cum commando, Hollander. Now, wash.”
“When did you learn the word technically?” Shane asked, and his words slurred a little. He let Rozanov rub shampoo into his hair, even though it was the hotel's own brand, and Shane never, ever washed with anything but what he’d brought himself. It felt nice though, to have Rozanov’s hands on his head, massaging his scalp and rubbing out the day's grime. It felt good.
Should it feel good? Shane was abruptly ten again, and in the showers with fifteen other variously aged boys. They had been discussing dick lengths when some of the oldest among them, perhaps thirteen or fourteen, called them all fags for showing so much interest.
Fag?
“I learn many words. I am in an American team, Hollander.” Shane was hardly listening to him though. Through lidded eyes he was devouring every precious inch of Rozanov’s body, and in his mind’s eye he was still in that locker room, so long ago, facing the wall and red with shame.
“Fucking Jesus..” He murmured.
“What?” Rozanov said, pausing with his hands still knotted in Shane’s hair. A foreign sort of concern laced his tone.
“Your body always fucks me up,” Shane said unconsciously, with a light laugh. “I’m literally such a fucking freak. There’s something wrong with me, Rozanov, there’s something wrong with me. Maybe you should stay away, not get too close..” He trailed off at the end of his sentence, tearing his eyes off Rozanov’s perfect cock to look back up at his perfect face instead. Rozanov was staring at him, and his hands were still in Shane’s hair. His unreadable expression sent Shane all the wrong messages. “I’m wrong. I’m all wrong, aren’t I?” Shane hissed, and his laughter melted into tears beneath the shower's rain. When had he started crying again? Or had he simply never stopped?
“No. Nooo!” Rozanov murmured. His tenor was one of reassurance and he was shaking his head, but Shane was beyond consoling. Shane heard Rozanov’s breath hitch wildly, and then they were in each other's arms again. Shampoo ran in white rivers down both of their shoulders. It slid down the dip of Shane’s spine, and had washed itself away by the time it reached his calves. He clung onto Rozanov as though he were a child, and sobbed. Far away, inside of his mind, he watched his ten year old self turn off the shower.
_______
When the light of morning first filtered in through the window, a deep and bruising blue that turned the room and its contents grey, Shane stirred at last from his sleep. He was sticky with sweat and felt feverish. He stayed there, quite still, in the quiet for a few minutes, staring passively out of the windows and trying to place himself. He realised he must have forgotten to close the curtains last night; the daylight was minimal but it was already beginning to hurt his eyes. He squinted and dug out his hand from beneath the covers to knead his forehead. Something rustled behind him and he froze, heart catching in his throat. He swallowed hard, as though a large, splintering rock had lodged itself halfway down his windpipe, and raised himself slowly onto one elbow. He glanced over his shoulder and blanched.
With all the grace of a rhinoceros, Shane was out of the bed. He flew backwards and nearly fell over his own feet, but by some miracle, Ilya Rozanov stayed sleeping. Shane’s heart was hammering beneath his ribcage. He felt like a trapped bird, backing up against the window, its surface freezing the exposed skin of his arse and back.
I’m naked? Oh Jesus.
A memory returned to him, and with it the same aching sense of sorrow he’d felt last night as Rozanov had called out simply, “Goodnight Hollander.” He could see himself as though perched upon his own shoulder, walking down a long and brightly lit corridor, his phone in his hand and a message on the screen, as yet unsent: “We didn’t even kiss”. Shane watched in horror as his own finger hovered over the send button. He admonished himself, and howled like an animal inside of his own brain. Don’t do that! Don’t do that! Don’t be that thick Shane! This can’t be anything, don’t try to make it something. But all the same, the message was sent, and all the same, Shane had fled into the stairwell and sprinted down all seven flights to his own floor.
And now Rozanov was here, on that floor, in Shane’s room, and Shane remembered enough to feel like he might be dying. Shaking, he looked around for some clothes and picked out from his unpacked suitcase the necessary shorts, tee shirt and jumper to try and outrun the consequences of his own unfathomable choices. He had slid his foot into one shoe and was trying to ignore the way his stomach seemed to be sliding around the inside of his abdomen, when a warm hand grasped him round the wrist.
He spun and came straight out of his Reebok. Rozanov was glaring at him, gloriously nude, his ringleted hair hung across his forehead. A silvery light seemed to highlight the curve of his shoulders and the wisps of his uppermost hairs. His eyes were small and dark.
“What the fuck are you doing Hollander?” His voice was rough from sleep and with it his accent had become even more pronounced. He cocked his head to one side and appraised Shane’s shambolic appearance; the running shorts, the mismatched T-shirt and hoodie, the phone in one hand and the room key in the other, the bed-head that Shane imagined was tumultuous at best. “Going out?”
Shane struggled to swallow. He took a tentative step towards the door as though ready to bolt, but Rozanov’s fingers tightened around his arm. Shane’s breathing was rapid and his head was burning now, or rather, all of him was burning. Beneath Rozanov’s stern gaze he seemed to have proceeded his fever and become a flame instead. Beneath his clothes he felt moisture building.
“Hollander?” Rozanov asked again. He looked impatient
“I’m going- for a run- yes..”
“Right now? Like that?”
Shane’s shoulders rose self-consciously, despite himself. “Like what?”
Rozanov shook his head, disbelievingly. “Like you are going to throw up on carpet.”
Shane gave a weak laugh, attempting humour, his favourite coping mechanism, “I don’t think there’s any more vomit left, Rozanov, I don’t think we need to worry.”
His joke fell awkwardly into the air between them, and Rozanov narrowed his eyes. He gave Shane’s wrist a tug and turned back towards the bed. Shane pulled half-heartedly against his hold but Rozanov succeeded easily in dragging him along at his heels regardless. Shane felt like a puppy in training.
“You are idiot, Hollander,” Rozanov sighed and sat down heavily on the mattress. It dipped beneath him and shane could not stop himself from staring at his chest, and his thighs, and the thing sandwiched between them. His face, already aflame, burned impossibly hotter, and he felt the blush as it spread up his throat to his cheeks. He stood awkwardly between Rozanov’s knees, feeling sick.
Six months. No kiss. Shane had even cleaned off his own cum before he’d left Rozanov’s hotel room.
“I need- I need to go for a run, Rozanov.” And I need you to be gone when I get back. Shane’s tone was curt. He was relieved his voice hadn’t cracked. The rest of him seemed to be splintering.
Rozanov had the gall to feign interest. “And running will help you, yes? Running will make you feel better? Make you look less like zombie? Make you-“ He faltered beneath the strength of Shane’s glower. He knocked Shane’s knee with his own and said, “You are angry with me, yes?”
Shane didn’t say anything for a moment. Something was bubbling beneath the surface, bursting at the seams of his skin. He wanted to shout himself hoarse, and scream, and cry, but he wasn’t drunk anymore, and he had no more excuses to be more honest than he should. They weren’t anything after all.
“No. We’re nothing. I can’t be angry at nothing.”
An alien look of hurt flickered across Rozanov’s face, rapidly replaced by a strange grimace. “We are nothing. And yet you text me after sex and say, no kisses? And you drink until you are sick, and cry and cry and cry. And I come and I comfort you and you hug me and yell at me and touch me and call yourself a freak, and then you stand here in morning and tell me we are nothing?” The silence that followed was poignant. Shane felt sicker. “Do you even believe yourself Shane?”
Shane. “Don’t call me that..”
Rozanov looked angry now. “What? Your name? You can call yourself freak but I cannot call you Shane?”
“NO!” Shane shouted, exploding at last like last night's firework. He ripped himself free of Rozanov’s hold and stood there for a long, stretching second, heaving. Words failed him. He could not speak. He was that little boy in the locker room again, he was himself every time someone else had used being gay to insult him. He was trapped inside of himself, and although he knew that Rozanov was not the enemy, Shane shrank away from him nonetheless. Rozanov’s face was a frozen picture that Shane could not, in his panic, identify. He launched himself towards the bathroom and slammed the door shut behind him, locking it just as Rozanov crashed into it from the other side. It creaked on its hinges beneath the man’s weight but Shane didn’t hear it, nor did he hear Rozanov’s frantic yelling. He had turned and seen his face in the mirror. His face, cheeks red and imprinted with the bed sheets thick creases. His hair, matted and oily. His eyes, angry and afraid.
He put a fist through his own reflection.