in the pursuit of great, we failed to do good.

“You ever want to try them?” Ilya asked lightly as he and Shane fixed a salad for the upcoming dinner with Yuna and David, both of them high on nervous energy, post-sex glow, and the strange feeling of being known by someone other than themselves.

Shane, who was chopping tomatoes, paused and looked at Ilya. “What, tomatoes? I have them all the–”

Ilya resisted the urge to kiss his stupid boyfriend silly right then and there. “No,” he answered, rolling his eyes. “‘Nice boys from Montreal.’” He’d tried not to let David’s question bother him earlier, but it’d been bouncing around in his head like a stubborn pingpong ball.

Shane’s hand on the knife froze, and when he blinked at Ilya he still looked a bit confused. “Ilya, I don’t like nice boys from Montreal. I like you.”

But of course, now his stupid, hateful brain had taken ahold of the situation and skated off with it, soaring down the rink in his mind towards the goal. “So you have tried other men?” he demanded, eyes narrowing just a little.

Now it was quiet. Shane obviously was struggling to find the right answer to that question, and Ilya knew he was being unfair. How many girls had he fucked before they were exclusive?

Finally, the shorter man sighed and looked him in the eyes resignedly. “Yes, Ilya. Two.”

He shouldn’t have asked. Fuck, he really shouldn’t have asked. Because now he was spiralling, gripping the counter until his knuckles turned white, hating two men he’d never met before. “And they were nice? They were Montreal men?” he grumbled, eyes cast downward.

“No.”

Again, his mind skated ahead of him, reaching. “They were not nice?” he snapped, whirling, ready to wage wars. “They hurt you? Where, Shane? Who? I will–”

But finally, Shane reached for him, directing his face so he was forced to look him in the eye, melting under chocolate brown and freckles and unfair beauty. “No, Ilya. They were…fine, I guess. They didn’t do anything wrong, exactly, they just…”

“What, Shane?” he asked, hissing through his teeth, wanting to throw a fit and run away and curl in on himself and cry all at the same time.

“They weren’t you.”

It looked like it pained Shane to admit this. Like he, too, wanted to run away and hide. But Ilya had no idea why, because suddenly, everything was right in the world again. “Not…” he breathed, needing to hear the words over and over.

Shane seemed to always innately understand what Ilya needed. It was soul-chrushing in the best way. “You, yeah,” he murmured. “I tried…to find someone else. To make my life fuckin’ easier that this, you know?”

Ilya laughed a humorless laugh, because fuck, loving Shane was easy, but the world made it so incredibly difficult. “Yes.”

“I couldn’t. It wasn’t just about…being gay. It was you. Asshole.” He spat the last word with little menace, lips curving upward as he did.

And it made Ilya so giddy, heart soaring, that he admitted it before he could stop himself. “You are not alone,” he murmured, grinning. “I think of you in bed. A lot. Is why I had to stop, with other people. I was nervous I would say your name.”

Shane’s answering smile lit up the entire kitchen. “Damn, Rozanov. You really like me, huh?”