HR is frying my brain

i also LOVED that fic so much.. do u think vivienne Knows about them.. like surely there's one family member going i know what you are shane hollander and ilya rozanov

i think vivienne has suspicions that there's a crush in there somewhere, but i don't think she KNOWS.

^ elle probably figured out which mutual luca was as soon as she was in the car on the way home (ive seen the user luca-rozanov thrown around which is so unsubtle and so funny) but luca doesn't figure out elle is hane-shollander until years after they met

GOD shane who knows his little cousin likes heckling grown ass men and has since she could barely fucking see over the wall who just assumes she's doing the same to luca, so he takes luca aside and is just, "listen, you can't let her get to you, okay? she's just having fun. she does the same to me all the time."

and now luca is internally having a crisis because he thinks this is shane saying he is somewhere on tumblr, too, and now he is about to have a panic attack thinking about if Shane Fucking Hollander has seen his in-depth hollanov analysis posts in person.

elle (who is. a demon) one day after a game is making introductions to a friend she brought along and goes, "and this is luca rozanov, no, oops, i mean haas. :) my mistake. :) right, luca? :)"

and luca is just

various dentists

hotel housekeeping staff

the kid who works late shifts at the drugstore where Ilya buys condoms (often) and lube (less often)

cleaners and laundry service employees

a kid on vacation with his parents in Vegas bored out of his mind because he's 14 and not allowed in the bars or casinos at their hotel and he's really hitting the grumpy teenager phase so he's pissed at his parents because he wanted to go birdwatching in the desert and instead he's on the hotel roof at night pointing his sick-ass binoculars (which he bought himself with money he earned by mowing their neighbours' lawns for a year) at the surrounding buildings and oh look there's two people making out on that rooftop terrace—wait, isn't that the guy from the Rolex ads?

Janice at the grocery store closest to the Hollander cottages who knows damn well that "David's boy" doesn't eat Nutella

the Voyageurs' nutritionist knows Hollander is fucking someone working for the Bears because he might not log it as sex but even Hollander doesn't actually do extra cardio after a game

employee at an airport phone repair kiosk in Chicago who was checking Ilya’s battery specs when "Jane" texted him "If I win you suck my dick first"

one of the parents at Game Changers Hockey Camp who is a couple's counsellor and a bit too good at her job

Gerry (78) three doors down from the Hollanders who has lived in his house since he was born and has made it his solemn duty to know everything that goes on in his neighbourhood

the owner of the bespoke jeweller's shop once Shane Hollander purchases the second ring, which is identical to the first, and a plain gold chain

behind the scenes vs the scene

Shane:

Ilya:

I’ve reread this scene about a hundred times because I’m currently writing an Anya fic, and somewhere in those hundred times something struck me: the only family that really loved and cared for Ilya abandoned him too. It wasn’t her fault. Irina was sick. But she still left him, and no one acknowledged how terrible that was when it happened because it was more important to save face and pretend it was an accident. Ilya wasn’t allowed to voice his pain or rage when it happened to him. With Anya, he gets to say it. He gets to acknowledge the cruelty of being left behind.

But even though she was abandoned, Anya is not mistrustful. She’s a happy-go-lucky dog, lovable and friendly with everyone. She carries this wound of abandonment, yet every time she meets a new person, all they notice is how friendly she is. How happy. A lot of formerly abandoned dogs are like this: desperate for affection, sweet, friendly to everyone. Doing everything they can to make themselves so lovable that no one will ever leave them again.

That’s the Ilya we see in Role Model. Boisterous, friendly, taking care of everyone else’s pain while hiding his own. It’s not until we get his POV in The Long Game that we see how much he’s suffering.

Shane sees it. When Anya cries at their bedroom door, Shane postpones his very favorite thing to do (fucking his boyfriend) because Anya is scared and alone. He gives Ilya permission to meet her needs, and Ilya can’t move fast enough.

I can’t screenshot the book bc my copy has it spread on two pages, but he says,

“Anya, sweet girl. What is the matter? Are you lonely?”

I think it’s really important we’re in Shane’s POV here. Shane heard her cry first. Shane said, “go get her.” Shane, Mr. “now the bed’s all dirty,” let Anya sleep in their bed because she was alone and she needed it. Shane is not the emotionally illiterate autistic stereotype the fandom makes him out to be. He’s already noticed this loneliness before with Ilya

The difference is, Anya asks for what she needs and lets them give it to her. Shane gets to be there for her in a way Ilya isn’t ready to accept yet. Ilya gets to give her the care he didn’t get as a child who lost his mother. They both can address Anya’s loneliness because she is a dog and she feels safe enough with them to ask.

Meanwhile, Ilya…

He’s not ready. Shane can’t give him what he needs yet because Ilya won’t let him, has spent too long denying his own wound.

- Ilya’s first sunburn, which is Very Bad. His are all cheeks all flushed and he’s walking funny and hissing through his teeth as he pushes on the reddened skin as it turns yellow. He yelps any time Shane tries to touch it, which is all the time because it’s funny and also because he likes touching Ilya.

- Shane catches a little sunfish off the end of the dock and puts it in a bucket full of water and Ilya sits in a Slavic squat in front of that bucket for hours on the dock watching the fish swim around. He’s sticking his hand in there to try and touch it and making embarrassing noises and jerking his hand away when he does manage to brush a finger along the scales. Until Shane tells him it needs to be released at some point and then Ilya is insisting on being the one to do it.

- Utterly failing at water skiing, with Shane trying to give tips while David drives the boat. Full on face of water, sputtering eating-shit so many times but insisting on going again, because Shane can do it so Ilya will do it too.

- Not tying up his shorts tight enough the first time David takes them tubing (despite his calm demeanour, once David has a tube behind his boat he drives like a maniac) and Ilya almost loses his shorts, white booty out. Shane can’t help but smack his ass and cackle as Ilya tries desperately to hold onto the tube handle with one hand and his shorts (that are around his knees) with the other while they continue to fly across the water.

- Ilya trying to dive off the dock in a life jacket because Shane told him it was impossible and now of course he has to try.

- Ilya in a life jacket in general.

- Ilya with a mosquito bite. Itching itching itching while Shane slaps at his hands and tells him to stop. It’s gets all red and raised bump, and Ilya’s kind of self conscious but he still can’t stop scratching and cursing mosquitos as he does. But then Shane’s pressing a careful thumbnail into an X over the bite and Ilya’s fascinated by another way he can be close to Shane.

- Ilya on the dock, on his stomach watching a spider eat a bug in its web for an undetermined amount of time. He’s narrating for Shane with a slightly disgusted but fascinated tinge to his voice who is suntanning beside him, sunglasses on.

- Ilya in the marsh trying to catch a frog after David explains how Shane used to do it all the time. He’s finally got one, calling Shane’s name with so much excitement and a frog cupped between his hands. Of course it’s the largest fugliest frog in the marsh so then they’re both crouched down, staring into Ilya cupped palms arguing about whether or not the frog is cute (Ilya says it is, Shane says it’s ugly)

- Ilya with a leech from the marsh stuck onto his ankle. He’s actually Losing His Shit about this one. freaky, disgusting, Canadian blood sucker. Why the fuck would they even have these things in the lake. Shane has to pull it off. Obviously he lets Ilya chase him around the property throwing his ankle towards Shane screaming “get it off, Shane! Get it off!” before he has Ilya sit on a sun chair and performs leech surgery on his ankle while Ilya whimpers (non-sexily).