Chapter Text
“1919." Shane kept an eye out for anyone skating too close. “That’s the code. For the front door. I’ll text it to you.”
“Front door? Brave.” Ilya knelt on the ice, stretching.
“Fuck you,” said Shane, no venom in his voice.
“Later," said Ilya, the ghost of a smirk on his face.
Shane skated back over to where Hayden stood, trying to keep his nerves and face in check. He was more nervous than usual about his rendezvous with Ilya tonight. They were going to talk, and it was either going to change everything or ruin it. Shane pushed his anticipation, his dread, everything Ilya made him feel down as far as it would go. He had a game to play.
After the game, Shane hit the showers and went straight home. He told himself he needed time to get ready, but what he really needed was to stop thinking. He showered again, scrubbed until his skin felt tight, straightened every pillow like order could make this easier, then paced until a soft knock sounded at the door.
“Hi,” he said, opening the door to reveal Ilya, dressed in dark jeans, a blue tank top, and a black leather jacket. Why did he have to look so tempting? Shane needed to resist, at least for now.
Ilya stepped inside and kissed Shane immediately, warm and familiar in a way that made Shane’s chest ache.
“Wait,” Shane put a hand on Ilya’s chest, gentle but firm. “We need to talk.”
Ilya’s face fell.
They’d slipped back into their usual rhythm after the All-Star game in Tampa. Except it hadn’t been usual. Something had shifted. The honesty, the intimacy. The way it felt safer, lately, to want more. Shane had done enough soul-searching to know what he wanted now.
“No, it’s good," said Shane quickly. "At least...I hope it is."
They sat. Shane turned, drawing one leg up and turning so he could face Ilya. Ilya still looked weary, like he was about to be scolded.
“I wanted to ask you something,” said Shane.
“Shane,” said Ilya, inhaling deeply.
“Will you come to my cottage this summer? Don’t go home. We can spend two weeks together. Two uninterrupted weeks, alone.”
He couldn’t stop the smile that came with it, the sweet ache of imagining it. No sneaking around or counting hours.
Ilya’s eyes went distant. “Shane. You know we can’t do that.”
“Why? Do you have to go home all summer?” Shane tried to keep his voice steady. “ What about one week?”
“It’s not about that.” Ilya sounded like he was begging already. “You know why we can’t.”
“No,” Shane said, and hated how small it came out. “I don’t.”
Ilya sighed, flopping back against the sofa.
“Haven’t you ever wanted more time?” Shane hated how needy he sounded.
“Of course I want that. But we can’t.” Ilya sat up again, elbows on his knees, looking at the floor like it held the answers to whatever was happening.
The room tilted. Shane watched him retreat behind that shut door he always had, the one Shane could never get through. He’d really thought Ilya would be happy. Maybe as excited as he was. His eyes burned.
Ilya looked back at him, and Shane’s stomach dropped. He recognized the look on Ilya’s face. Fear.
“Do you want to fuck or not?” Ilya asked, voice flat.
Shane knew he could just say yes. They could go upstairs, fuck, part ways, and slip back into the old arrangement like tonight hadn’t happened. Like Tampa hadn’t happened. Like that call from Moscow hadn’t happened.
But he couldn’t. Not anymore.
“No,” he said. The word scraped on the way out. “I don’t. What are we even doing? I thought we—” His throat closed around the rest of it.
If Ilya couldn’t come because he had to go home, Shane could’ve accepted it. He could’ve made it make sense. But this sounded like rejection.
“Why is this such a big deal to you?” Ilya shot back. “Why can’t we keep doing what we’re doing?”
The annoyance in his voice snapped something in Shane.
“Because I love you, you fucking asshole.”
Silence. No turning back now. Either they were doing this, or they weren’t.
Shane wished he could slow down time and study every emotion that flickered across Ilya’s face. Ilya’s gaze darted over Shane’s features, blinking too fast. Tears clung to his lashes, but his mouth was pulled into a thin line.
“Damnit, Hollander,” he breathed.
Hollander. Not Shane.
“Tell me you don’t feel the same.” Shane’s voice broke on the last word. “Tell me you feel nothing for me, and I’ll drop it. We can go back to fucking.”
He couldn’t lose Ilya entirely. He’d go back to what they were doing. No feelings, at least out loud. Back to always wishing for more. Tears slid down his face anyway, hot and silent.
“Of course I don’t feel nothing—fuck.” Ilya dragged his hand through his hair hard, as if he could scrub the thought away. “That's the problem. That’s why we can’t do this.”
Shane didn’t answer. The air felt too thin to breathe. He hadn’t planned for tonight to turn into this. If he could rewind it, he’d just take Ilya upstairs the second he walked in. No conversation. They would have had sex, talked about normal things, and parted ways on the same good terms.
Now…that was off the table, and Shane wasn’t ready to deal with what that meant.
“I need to go.” Ilya stood too fast, like he might be able to outrun whatever was happening. He rubbed his hand across his face, through his hair again. He looked down at Shane for a moment, his face anguished, like he wanted to say more.
Shane couldn’t meet his eyes.
Eventually, Ilya turned and walked out. The door clicked shut behind him, the sound echoing through the apartment. Shane stayed where he was, letting the tears fall.
Something in him broke then, quiet and final. He sat very still, as if moving might make it worse, and let the tears fall. If he ever managed to put himself back together, it would be missing pieces. Pieces that had followed Ilya out into the hall like they belonged to him, like they’d always belonged to him. Years ago, without either of them noticing, Ilya had started stealing Shane in small, quiet increments, one look, one touch, one night at a time, until there was barely anything left that wasn’t his.
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Shane had a home game two days later against Seattle. He did his best to pull himself together, but even Hayden kept glancing over like he was trying to read him.
“You okay?” Hayden asked.
“Yeah,” Shane lied. “Must’ve eaten something that didn’t agree.”
It made it easier to disappear into a bathroom stall when his throat tightened and he needed an extra minute to remember how to breathe like a normal person. He splashed water on his face, stared at himself in the mirror until his eyes stopped looking wrecked, then forced his shoulders to loosen and walked back out like nothing was wrong.
On the bench, as he started pulling on his gear, he took his phone out and opened his thread with Lily. The last messages taunted him. His vision blurred. He shoved the phone away fast, blinking hard, praying Hayden wouldn’t ask again.
It was no surprise he wasn’t playing well tonight. Normally the ice cleared his head. Today it didn’t. His focus kept slipping, half a second here, half a second there, until he was skating purely on instinct.
Near the end of the first period, he finally saw a chance to make it up. He had the puck and a lane opened. He accelerated, already picturing the play—
—and missed what he would’ve caught any other night.
The hit came from his blind side. A sudden, brutal weight slamming into him. The sound of it was deafening, as if the ice itself cracked.
For a split second, everything went white.
Then everything went black.