Always Keep Fighting

Ilya, however, never quite got the hang of it. He knows a lot of his teammates nap whenever and wherever, falling asleep before games in hotel rooms or resting up on the road, snores filling the team bus or plane, but Ilya can't quite get there. It's probably a remnant from childhood, from not feeling safe enough to let his guard down like that. He can't even imagine what the reaction would have been if his father had come home to find him asleep on the couch. He was certainly quick enough to accuse him of laziness without Ilya handing over additional ammunition for free.

But Ilya loves holding Shane when he naps. He loves how quickly his body grows lax, loves the gradual shift in the depth of his breaths, loves the warmth of his body pressed against him, loves his sleepy little sounds and scrunched little face when he wakes up, loves that Shane trusts him enough to be that vulnerable around him. Shane doesn't really know that Ilya doesn't nap, not with how often Ilya's the one to suggest one, not with the way Ilya makes sure to feign coming out of sleep as soon as he feels Shane shift in his arms in that particular way that suggests he's waking up. He doesn't want to risk Shane feeling like Ilya's doing him a favour with holding him through his naps, doesn't know whether he can admit how much he loves their naps even though they never include Ilya falling asleep. He likes the way things are. He doesn't want to risk it changing.

"The sex tells the story, so it never felt gratuitous to me. The sex is character development. The sex is what is moving this relationship forward, and watching it change over time."

And this kid did not have a lot of friends. His teachers thought he wasn't very smart because he made everything about hockey. And they dismissed him when he struggled with math and reading. "if you could just put some of your hockey energy into school, then maybe you would get better." His classmates laughed at the hockey themed valentines day cards him and his mom had to hand make because nowhere was selling hockey themed valentines day cards. And they laugh at him when he repeats the same thing over and over about "getting pucks deep, pucks deep, pucks deep." When he would play all by himself on the yard pretending he was skating, picking up any big stick he could find on the ground, they'd push him around. "Can we play? We'll be defenders" and ram him and take his stick. And he'd just go through all the penalties they would have just gotten over and over again until he can calm down. He celebrated every birthday at the ice rink in his full hockey gear even though he didn't really have classmates showing up. Not for lack of invite.

And his parents try to steer him away from it. They try and watch new sports, they try and get him to watch kids shows, get into things kids his age like, but all he wants to do is watch reruns of the metros cup wins. Wants to wear his hat backwards with his black shirt because that's how Shane looks in the interviews. Memorizes the answers he gives in french even though this kid never learned french in school. And its useless. This kid is hooked and they just kinda have to ride this wave.

So when the announcement comes for the Game Changers camp, these parents do absolutely everything to get him there. They don't care what it takes, this is like a light for all of them really in the midst of all the bullying at school and the meltdowns at home and the obsessive routines that fall apart if even one thing is out of place.

And they explain to the camp that their boy might have a hard time. Might need some time to adjust. That he struggles with math, and reading, and can get caught up in all the rules sometimes. Preemptively trying to say "he's not a bad kid. he's trying his best."

So at the end of the first day, his parents are prepared for a meltdown. Its new, its a lot of kids, the rink can get loud and cold, and he doesn't always do well with transitioning out of hockey. He's hard to pull off the ice at home.

And they can see some upset under the surface when they arrive. He clearly doesn't want to go home. Thats no surprise.

What is a surprise is the way Shane gets down on one knee next to where the boy is sitting upset on the ground. He doesn't move to touch him. He just gets down and the two of them softly have a chat. The boy is tugging on his hair and nodding at what Shane says. And eventually he stands and the parents walk over to them.

"You must be the parents. Its good to meet you," Shane says softly. "I was just going over some things about tomorrow. So that way he would know the schedule."

And they can see their son isn't quite happy, still clearly exhausted. He'll nap in the car and be grumpy at dinner. But he is much more regulated than they expected him to be.

"And, I was telling him about my schedule when I go home. About getting some quite time, making sure I can decompress. I think that's what all good hockey players need, right buddy?"

"Right buddy," he repeats.

So it becomes real but not at the same time. So they call each other in the evenings, a few times a week, not too much. Ilya sends texts that say You looked good in Buffalo tonight, great game and Does your hole feel empty without me and, worst of all, he texts things like Did your sink ever get fixed I know the dripping was driving you crazy. And he forces himself not to think about what any of it means. And he doesn't stop. Doesn't even really think about stopping, anymore.

He lets his teammates think that things are getting serious with Montreal Girl, because it's a good excuse for why he's not pulling and the guys have formed a narrative that makes sense. Of course Rozanov is settling down now. He just buried his father. Those kinds of things put life into perspective. Time to get serious, time to be a man. He's gonna get a wife and have a couple of kids and slap the Rozanov name on all of them and make dearly departed Papa so very very proud.

Some of it is not untrue, if one considers that Shane IS Montreal Girl, and things are getting serious. Serious in a hot, messy way that neither of them completely knows what to do with. As a younger man, as the kid he really no longer is, Ilya always assumed that this kind of thing would feel like a fucking prison--and it does, but in almost the exact opposite way of what he'd supposed. The bars aren't to keep him in, but to keep Shane out, and it's feeling more and more like Shane is bending the bars, pushing them out of the way and sneaking into the cell with him, and fuck if it's the only thing Ilya wants, to live in this prison with Shane. And maybe they can leave it together someday. But he never says any of it.

The Metros make the playoffs, number three seed against the Admirals' number two. And the first major upset of the playoff season occurs when the Metros knock the Admirals out in game seven of the series after some particularly nasty hockey is played on both sides. Scott Hunter was playing like he had something to prove and Shane Hollander was playing like a man who had nothing to lose--because a two-time Stanley Cup winning captain going for his third actually, really does have nothing to lose.

The Metros go home in the Conference finals. Boston sends them home. They do not even make it to the fucking couch that night. Ilya fucks Shane on the goddamn floor in the entryway of his house, in front of the windows, presses bruises on top of bruises. Shane is feral, biting and snarling and only submitting when Ilya puts a hand against the back of his neck and says, “Who do you fucking belong to?” and Shane says, “You, fuck, it’s always been you,” like it’s being drawn from him with a knife.

Ilya Rozanov wins his second Stanley Cup on a June night in Nashville. He still hasn't slept when his back hits the sheets of a hotel suite he doesn't remember walking into, six o'clock in the morning with dawn behind the curtains. Shane is up for his morning jog. He says he's taking it along the lake. He says he watched the game with his parents the night before. He goes quiet on the other end of the line and Ilya drunkenly hums a tune he heard at some point during the night.

Shane says, "I'm so fucking proud of you, baby," and that, too, sounds like it's being ripped from his unwilling body. There is so much love and jealousy and affection and spite wrapped up in it that Ilya can only laugh. It has never felt more strange, that they are the only two people in the entire world who know about this. This beautiful, awful, insane thing they do. The fact that they cannot talk about it, even to each other.

Ilya goes to Russia.

Ostensibly, he is tying up loose ends. He is visiting his mother's grave. He is giving his niece presents while she stares at him like she doesn't remember him putting her on his shoulders when she was little. Because she probably doesn't. And God knows what her father has said about him, now that she is old enough to understand. It's supposed to be a one-month trip. When the summer spits them out onto training camps, Ilya has only been back in the States for 72 hours.

He has spent the entire summer calling Shane as the moon rises in Moscow, to the point where Shane had eventually confessed to him that his dick had started having a Pavlovian reaction to the clock in his living room announcing that it's gone two o'clock.

Ilya has gone so long without having any thought about fucking someone who isn't Shane, in fact, that he doesn't even think to vocalize any of it. It's just a part of his being now. This brain that sometimes thinks awful things, and these hands that were built to play hockey and throw punches and touch freckles. This dick that only gets hard for Shane Hollander. Ruined for everyone else.

(One time, over the summer in Russia, a girl approached with that familiar look on her face and he'd leaned over and shook his head and said, "I'm married," just to feel the words in his mouth. It hadn't felt like a lie.)

So too much has been said. Or not enough. Or the right things, but to the wrong people. Sveta knows about Jane. She probably has her suspicions on who he is. Ilya is sure that Shane has not said fucking word to anyone, save perhaps Rose Landry. There have been a few implications. But nothing has been said.

So he opens the door to Shane after the first Boston-Montreal matchup of the season and it's perhaps only the third or fourth time they've been together since Tampa. And so much is left unsaid. And so much has been said. And Ilya's body craves Shane's like a fucking addict. It's not his fault that they, again, don't make it to the bed. The couch is close enough.

Shane thinks it's funny--he's in fine form, body moving atop Ilya's with only the absolutely necessary clothes removed. Joggers, underwear. The socks and the crewneck sweatshirt (Metros logo, tiny 24 over the breast almost like a kid with his name sewn into the collar) and the fucking baseball cap he'd worn for anonymity in the cab all stay on. He's panting by the end, overheated in his layers, laughing and running his fingers over Ilya's jaw and telling him that the beard burn on his thighs from playoffs took an entire week to heal. Ilya tells him You loved it and Shane blushes and arches and says, "Yeah, I did," and he's glorious.

Then Ilya lifts him off and slaps his ass and sends him marching into the bathroom with a command to make himself decent again, which Shane scoffs at even as he walks away, awkward swing to his step, wet trail down the back of his thigh.

He is not so glorious when he returns.

He wears a pair of Ilya's sweatpants and he smells like Ilya's soap but he's frowning and he puts himself a whole cushion away from Ilya. When Ilya scooches to him, showing off his shoulders just a bit, Shane watches him come but pulls his face away when Ilya tries to kiss him.

"Baby," Ilya pouts against his shoulder. "What is it?"

"Nothing," Shane mutters. And the thing is, Ilya knows that Shane is lying. He also knows that if something spooked him this bad a year ago, he would have been ten minutes gone already. Ilya knows that he is trying.

"What scared you?" Ilya murmurs. "Hm? I bet if you tell me, I can explain."

Shane twists his head to the side again, but this time it's more like he doesn't want to be seen. Ilya sees his jaw tense, untense.

"I just don't think it's very fair," Shane says after moment.

"What is not fair, lyubimyy?"

"You..." Shane scoffs, draws a hand through his hair. "You'll fuck her in your bed, but when I show up you--fuck me on the couch or the floor--"

"Shane," Ilya says. "What did you see?"

"Her fucking--" Shane sighs, and says the word bra under his breath like some people say fucking, but Shane Hollander does everything backwards, it sometimes seems, "is on top of your laundry bag, and your bed's a mess. How recently was she here?"

"Shane," Ilya says.

"I get it, you know. I--maybe I don't love it, honestly, but I do get it. We don't see each other much, and even if we did, it's--" Shane sighs, squeezes his eyes shut. "It's not like I can expect anything. I get that. But could you just...I don't know, is it too much to ask that you change your sheets after you've been with her? Before I get here?"

"Hollander."

"Is that too much to ask?" Shane sounds like he's genuinely asking. Like he actually thinks he's toeing over some invisible line between them.

"The bed is a mess because I am bad sleeper," Ilya tells him, not ungently. He doesn't say, You would know this if you had ever once stayed. Doesn't say it because they've beat that particular horse dead. They've both made their apologies. Several months of cross-continental Skype calls leaves a lot of time to talk things out, once the jerking off is over.

Shane scoffs. "Whatever."

"No, is true." Ilya smacks a kiss onto his shoulder, and then onto his neck. "I kick like donkey. And I took a nap before you came, because I wanted to stay up all night and fuck you very nicely right until you have to leave in the morning."

Shane shudders and gapes and says, "We'd have to sleep at some point."

"You could. I wouldn't mind."

Ilya sees the shudder that runs through him, and the dilation of his pupils, and the very deliberate way that he visibly shelves that train of thought to take back down later.

"The bra?" Shane mumbles.

"Has probably been here for years. When I find it, I send it to laundry with everything else. I do not know where it always hides."

"That's..." Shane screws up his face. "Sort of too stupid not to be true."

"Is truth. Would you like to hear another truth?" Ilya waits patiently for Shane to give his little furrow-browed nod. "You are only person I have ever fucked on the floor. Only person who ever wanted it that bad. Only person slutty enough to let me."

Shane's inhale is deep, shuddery. His whole chest expands with it and he swings his face away from Ilya like his breath on his face is too overwhelming. Ilya grins.

"Ask me," Ilya whispers. "Ask me how many people I've fucked this year."

Shane clears his throat. "How many?"

"One."

Another gasp.

"Now ask me the other thing," Ilya whispers. "Ask me for what you want, Hollander."

Shane's lips part to admit his tongue between them, pink and wet. Ilya watches his lips curl over his teeth, his eyes dilate, and he knows that he is absolutely fucked.

"Fuck me," Shane whispers. "Just me. Please. Make me yours. Be mine."

Ilya stands up, pulls Shane along with him. In a move that's becoming quite practiced, he gets his hands under Shane's thighs and lifts him, and all 200 pounds, six feet of hockey player are in his arms easily.

"Where are we going?" Shane asks, though he clearly knows the answer.