aaa

It started when he was a kid and he was trying to help everyone get better at hockey including the opposing teams players, he would say something like “your stick grip is weak” or “you’re slow on your right” (idk i don’t know hockey very well ESPECIALLY little kid hockey) but he says it totally deadpan because little Shanebug doesn’t understand tone yet.

This makes the other teams so mad! They try and fight him constantly! Little bitty baby hockey fights and then Yuna sits him down in middle school after the first fight that he actually gets hurt (black eye and bloody lip) and asks him what he is saying to make everyone fight him?

“Nothing mean I swear mom!!! I’m trying to be nice and help correct their form”

And suddenly Yuna gets it and explains to Shane that not everyone but especially not the opposing team likes to have their flaws pointed out to them even if it’s coming from a good place and how that could be seen as chirping.

So he stops for a while, then his coach for world juniors tells him to try and piss off Rozanov enough that they can draw a penalty. So Shane does what he does best and points out a flaw at each face off. Jokes on him though because Ilya is actively changing those things and getting better every face off because he is taking it for what it is, advice.

Which pisses Shane off, he thinks his chirping tactic won’t work now that he is older. So he points out at his first scrimmage at practice in Montreal that the center who has been there for years (who he is probably replacing) is favoring his left side is staying too far left to compensate (again I don’t know hockey so I am trying to translate things I know about soccer lol)

And the center loses it on him! Immediately yelling about the lack of respect and how a rookie makes it to the MLH and thinks they are hot shit.

So Shane realizes his chirping DOES work just not on rozanov and becomes a menace he studies game tape specifically to find holes in his opponents game and pre prepares chirps and it fucking works because all these men are so far up their own asses that they just get mad instead of using the advice.

and the truth is that the team was playing against someone ilya and/or shane ESPECIALLY hates, which means shane was dropping the most vicious, lethal reads known to man and making ilya crack tf up to the point that they were attracting attention and the coach was just afraid of someone reading lips and getting them all in trouble

and signficantly, the three person buffer between them just keeps shane from SAYING his comments

But I feel like this is the point of connection that gets Shane to actually accept Troy as a guy he can vibe with. They make the mistake of putting Troy as one of the guys in between Shane and Ilya only for Shane to keep muttering things and Troy to pick right up where Ilya left off on dragging people. Troy may have been a homophobic menace for a while but not he’s a homosexual menace and Shane can very much so get down with that. Ilya has almost as much fun listening to them banter as joining in.

"My supermodel. See how fucking beautiful you look here. You are hockey and sex. Everyone in this city sees this billboard and wants to fuck you. But only I can. Only I get to fuck the sexy billboard man."

He keeps Shane this way for ages, not touching him, bringing him right to the edge, only to stop and talk about another part of Shane's photo he likes like he's talking about a work of art in a gallery. Then he goes right back to fucking him.

When he finally wraps a hand around Shane's cock and tells him that it's okay to let go, that he's done so well and that Ilya wants to see him come for him now, Shane comes so hard he almost blacks out.

It is peak situationship era, Ilya is in some away game and not against Montreal, Boston has booked him the room and he's sharing it with Marlow or something

And Ilya normally would like it, think it's funny, send Hollander a picture of the window with some chirp, get a bit worked up about it when he's alone... But he's not alone, and Cliff thinks this is HILARIOUS

So Cliff takes pictures of this window and this huge billboard, and you can see a bit of the room, the bed, they're actually nice pictures

And he starts to talk about it at the group chat "hey, any of you lucky fellas also have a room facing North? 😏" and no, no one does so what is Cliff on about?

So Cliff sends the picture to the groupchat and it explodes, all sort of comments, they're acting like pigs, shooting the shit, the saner and less dirty ones being things like "didn't know it was that type of hotel" "I think that room must have cost extra" "I bet the sheets get changed much more often in that side of the hotel", and, because they're not in Montreal "do you think Hollander's fans know?"

And Ilya is already trying to keep it together after watching his straight teammates all slobber over a giant half naked Shane Hollander, sure it's all jokes, but some of them really went into detail, some locked in and pointed out specific drops of moisture amplifyed by %10.000. Some of them are making plans to go to Cliff and Ilya's room later to see it in person, for what?? But he keeps it togheter, scowls and just ignores it, even if the team is trying to bring him into their jokes "Something tells me Roz won't be able to sleep"

But Ilya is keeping it together, that is until Cliff says "Oh, Hollander fans MUST know"

And Cliff tweets the picture of the hotel room and it's window, in all his glory, taken with his very expensive phone with amazing camera, and captions it "For all of you sick fucks out there, if you're going to Buffalo, you might want to stay at the North facing side of the Wyatt hotel... It's got a view"

We don’t talk about this enough. With all the big romantic gestures in The Long Game, this, to me, is one of the most romantic moments.

We know Ilya isn’t a fan of Shane’s restrictive diet. He teases him about it, but Ilya is an expert ragebaiter who knows how to tease the people he cares about when they feel safe and in ways that never really hurt.

Shane is “frantic” in this scene. Ilya has the perfect opening to say something about his diet, and he doesn’t take it. He sees that Shane is panicking, steps in and fixes it. He was looking at that menu thinking about Shane and Shane’s fuckass diet that Ilya doesn’t even like. But he knows this is important to Shane. He knows Shane is already nervous about being on a date with Ilya in public and being with another queer couple. So he meets Shane’s needs without Shane ever having to ask, and he does it quietly, without drawing any attention, so that Shane can save face.

Of course he’s gonna tease him about it a little bit later because that’s what they do. But he only does that AFTER Shane’s had a chance to catch his breath and feel safe again.