Hayden doesn’t see or hear Shane laugh until after Shane and Ilya are outed.
He’s seen Shane Hollander laugh. That forced, professional, made-for-the-cameras laugh. He’s seen Captain Shane laugh, with a short, restrained smile before he gets right back to business. He’s seen My Best Friend Shane laugh at dinner with Jackie and the kids, in a way he’d thought was real for over a decade because it looked like it reached his eyes.
Then he watches the way Shane—not Captain, not the kids’ Uncle Shane, not post-game press Hollander; this is the real Shane—lights up when Rozanov whispers something in his ear. There’s no other way to describe it. Shane leans in to listen to whatever Rozanov has to say and the way his face breaks open into pure, unfiltered joy is just…
Damn, Hayden thinks to himself. Where was this Shane the whole time?
Shane laughs so long and so hard that he can barely breathe. He’s red in the face, wiping away tears and gasping for air as he tries to hold in the giggles—and that’s the only way to describe the sound; these are uncontrollable, soul-deep giggles. He loses the fight over and over, dissolving into laughter every time Rozanov looks his way.
He was here the whole time, Hayden says internally. We just didn’t see him.
He thinks back to every locker room conversation, every victory party, every team dinner where Shane had seemed happy. Every shared hotel room and late-night talk where he’d asked if his friend was okay because something had felt off and he’d assumed that behind closed doors and closed-off smiles, Shane was lonely. Every conversation they’ve had with JJ since The Video, where Shane looked down and clammed up. Every practice where he stopped looking angry when Comeau stopped passing to him and the other players followed suit, and he’d just looked blank.
I’m good.
I’m fine.
You worry too much.
What are you, my mother?
Rozanov—Ilya—hauls Shane into his lap by the waist and plants a wet, sloppy kiss onto his freckled cheek. The Shane Hayden knows—knew?—would’ve made a face at the extreme physical contact. This Shane laughs harder and revels in the affection, tilting his head and giving the other man access to his neck.
Fuck, we didn’t see him, Hayden thinks. I didn’t see him. I didn’t hear him. I let him disappear right in front of me.
…am I a shit friend?
