liar is actively telling you this.

Whenever they go out with the Centaurs after games, Shane will find a table and Ilya will head to the bar. That's how it has been since Shane signed with the Cens and none of the guys really think twice about it anymore, it's just the way they do things. Division of labour or whatever. But even as the night goes on, no matter how many rounds they get, Ilya is always the one who goes to the bar to order.

The reason behind it is simple. Whether Shane will be drinking tonight, what he will be drinking, and how much is Ilya's decision. It's his responsibility.

Ilya knows that if the decision was up to Shane he wouldn't really drink at all during the season and, most of the time, he respects that. The majority of the time, he'll return with a beer for himself and a ginger ale for Shane. But sometimes he'll bring over a beer for Shane as well. Shane will usually wrinkle his nose a little at the first sip but he'll always thank Ilya, regardless. Ilya usually makes do with one round for him but sometimes it's two or three and with every beer he brings over, Shane dutifully thanks him and drinks it.

A few times, Ilya has brought shots. He'll never bring Shane shots during times where they would truly impact his performance; never the day before a game, never when the pressure of the season is ramping up. But when their schedule allows for it and the mood strikes, Ilya will bring him shots. For no other reason than because he wants Shane to take them. He wants to watch the way his face scrunches up, like he bit down on a lemon. He wants to watch him sputter at the burn of the alcohol. He wants to hear him thank him for something he knows he didn't want. He wants to watch him get loose and sloppy. Sometimes he just wants to see Shane drunk. And Shane is his. If Ilya wants to see him drunk, then he'll see him drunk.

On nights when Ilya buys Shane shots, he usually stays sober himself. At most, he'll have one beer before switching to Cokes. He wants to stay alert enough to make sure he doesn't make Shane overdo it and he wants to stay alert enough to get to enjoy Shane's lack of inhibition. He also knows that if both of them got drunk, they'd likely end up with a public indecency charge, because drunk Shane loves nothing more than putting his hands on his husband's body. He'll stroke up Ilya's chest, run his fingers through his hair, he'll hold his hand and hardly ever let it go. On more than one occasion he has fully crawled into Ilya's lap and stuck his tongue down his throat without any prompting.

Shane is like no! It’s embarrassing! And this is public! And you wouldn’t make me actually do that to Rose would you? You know the answer, I’m gay!

Only Rose thinks the whole thing is hilarious and gives Shane the go ahead so there’s no real reason to resist Ilya’s begging anymore, still he holds out to the day before the interview.

“Fine! Fine! You can ask about Rose, but I get to ask about anything I want too!” And Ilya’s like yes yes of course my love. His boring Shane would hardly ask anything damning.

Fast forward to the day of the interview Shane is fondly exasperated with Ilya’s Rose questions, and Ilya is being a cocky bastard so happy with how it played out.

Until they switch sides and Shane breaks out his first question:

“Is it or is it not true that despite famously calling Scott Hunter ‘a nearly extinct fossil’ you think he’s hot?” The blood drains from Ilya’s face pretty quickly after that.

“Do you think Hayden Pike is a good hockey player?”

“Do you consider Hayden Pike a close friend?”

“Who do you love more: me or Anya?”

“Besides me who is your favorite teammate?”

“…You mean Hollzy?”

is that ilya is actually my sweet precious baby. and i love him so much. and when i think about everything he has been through (and i do not mean playing on a bad hockey team that he signed up to be on--i mean like, finding his mother's corpse when he was twelve) i feel legitimately sad in real life. i have been known to shed human tears thinking about him alone on a new continent with no one to sit with him on her birthday or the anniversary of her death, no one to know his stories about her, no one to share his grief and trauma for so many years

and in the past i've said that ilya loverboy rozanov would never treat #hisshane the way ilya treats shane in those last few chapters. he would never let shane be persecuted out of a job and publicly humiliated and lose all his friends and mock him because of it.

but actually someone who has been through as much as ilya has, and is in such a distressed place... yeah, he might act in all kinds of ways that aren't like him, at any point. he might be a really really bad support system for his husband at the worst time in shane's life, because ilya's innate emotional intelligence and kindness might not be enough to help him figure out how to be a good or even decent partner to shane through this because trauma recovery doesn't happen on a schedule and sometimes one person's trauma means they hurt someone else. and ilya is capable of cruelty, and sometimes anger and selfishness and defensiveness are symptoms of trauma and grief, and sometimes they are wounding to the people we love most at the worst times in thier life, when they most need us at our best

then they have to come back from that. and go forward together. can ilya find and accept the help he needs. can shane forgive him. can they build a life together in the Aftermath not just of being outed and shane's career collapsing but also ilya's failures to support him

Sometimes people develop maladaptive coping strategies in childhood to deal with stress, trauma and abuse that is out of their control and carry those into adult life without addressing them.

Sometimes people can be selfish and grasp onto things for their own happiness and not recognise (or be in denial) about how they impact others.

Sometimes people end up being their worst selves with the people they love the most.

I think the first step to rehabilitating the Ilya of The Long Game to me is for him to recognise the severity of what happened to Shane and how much he and everyone around him have been downplaying it. And then apologise and CHANGE HIS BEHAVIOUR!

If we are looking for an in-universe explanation for Shane's behaviour at the end of The Long Game (by which I mean, not absolutely losing his shit, including at his husband) then it's that he is repressing and compartmentalising like a motherfucker.

He is pushing everything down, down, down. He's happy! Ilya deserves this after all his suffering! A marriage is a team, right? It doesn't matter who has the bigger pay or the leadership role. The fact that all of Shane's worst nightmares came true, his accomplishments have been devalued and his integrity and reputation is in tatters - that's just the haters, don't listen to them. It's not actually that bad. In fact, being outed was for the best! Don't worry, everything is totally fine!!!!

i love love love the way you're imagining shane's headspace here. 'in fact being outed was for the best!' in my long!fic i'm writing right now, shane has been through something incredibly traumatic and his whole internal narrative about it is like 'well i'll do my rehab and i'll be fine and then i'll move on, why is everyone trying to make a big deal out of this.' i think shane would always respond to adversity by trying to Focus On What Matters (hockey, ilya) and compartmentalizing what doesn't (his own emotions that he's ill-equipped to handle). under those circumstances i could absolutely see him convincing himself that He's Fine Really

i've been trying to think through exactly how ilya's trauma could intersect with the circumstances in a way that makes him behave this out of character and i think i've got it. one of ilya's core beliefs is that Everyone Will Always Leave Me Alone To Suffer (Just Like Mama Did), and especially that when circumstances become difficult that means he's about to end up completely alone again. and now they're in difficult circumstances, and there's this thread of hope that... is shane coming here? this time, when the person i love is suffering, are they going to draw closer to me, instead of disappearing forever? and then when that does happen and shane is on the centaurs, he's claiming everything is Good and Fine but obviously it isn't, ilya can see shane is miserable even if shane can't. and ilya's subconscious traumatized mind goes "oh, right. he's miserable, it's almost Leave Ilya Alone Forever time. guess i'd better show him the worst of me right now and put that to the test because my inner traumatized 12-year-old is running the show," forgetting that he already tried this in Sochi and in Vegas and shane has stuck with him every time, because it's not like a conscious decision

i think as a writer i would probably resolve this not by having shane crash out but by having ilya say some nasty little jab that makes shane have to stand up and leave the room to get control of his feelings because he doesn't want to show anyone he's upset and ruin things for ilya. and ilya suddenly hears what he just said and he's horrified and he goes after shane fully expecting shane to have finally realized ilya isn't good for him and when he says as much shane just quietly says "well, i love you. we're a team. the only one i have left."