this episode was beautiful and happy and sunshiny, so im here to bring in the angst by pointing out that in this episode shane, in addition to having ilya, had a check in text from rose, had a check in call from hayden, had the love and support of his parents, and was in the one place in the world where he felt the safest and most comfortable. and ilya, who flew to shane and travelled to some isolated place that he was completely out of his element in, who made the massive decision of leaving boston and moving to ottawa, who went from occasional clandestine hookups with men to coming out as bi to strangers and calling himself their son's boyfriend - ilya who made all these massive scary leaps, who did he have? he had shane. and just shane.

Breaking my silence on heated rivalry. Here's my main thought. It is so fabulous to me to watch these two like proper acting theory pilled animal work clowning physical theatre guys (a type i am highly familiar with) grappling in some kind of sisyphean hand to hand combat with some of the most awkward fanfiction dialogue ever written. And well sometimes they win. But always the point of fascination is the fight.

i know hockey rpf has been a loadbearing pillar of gay fic forever but this recent influx of hockey fpf (fake person fiction) has upset the balance. the ecosystem needs to recover