biscuits i guess...?

he and ilya are hanging out in the yard and some bees are buzzing around because some watermelon juice spilled on the ground earlier and shane suggests they go inside or rinse the juice off the patio and ilya teases him about being scared of little bees and shane SO nonchalantly just, "no, but i am allergic and you don't know where my epipen is"

and ilya

reblogging with my own tags because i'm also CACKLING imagining the implications of this not being specific to ilya, either. they're having a barbeque at hayden and jackie's house and hayden is good-naturedly encouraging shane to try a piece of coffee cake or something and ilya just goes, "no, bad for you"

and hayden IMMEDIATELY is on the defensive because what? you get to tell him what to eat now? where do you get o-

"no, bad for him because it has walnuts in it, pike. you want him to die? this is what you want?"

"what are you talking about?"

shane: "i'm allergic"

"??? since WHEN??"

"since always??"

"you've eaten over at my house HOW many times?? and never brought this up? the fuck, dude?"

"jackie knows"

the idea of ilya on instagram accidentally pressing like while DEEP in allergy mommy blogging territory and natalie from That Allergy Mama DMing him to be like "hi, my husband wants me to tell you he says hi and that he's a big fan and also that call against you against san francisco was bullshit." "hello, husband of natalie. also do you have any suggestions for substituting peanuts in this recipe?"

he gets filmed for a what i eat in a day/day in the life type video and is so used to thinking about substitutes at this point that he doesn't even think about it when he mentions them in passing. they keep an allergy friendly household so the stuff he mentions is compliant, but it's paired with comments like, "and then i add some wowbutter, which is soybeans and not peanuts. we also sometimes have sunflower seed butter, but the texture for this is better with the wowbutter. i have also tried this, what is it called-shane: the gross paste with beans" *shane, offscreen from the living room*: "chickpea butter?" "yes, this." "it's nasty" "yes, not good. their jar says it is, but it is not. anyway-"

A. the idea of ilya being lowkey stressed about shane surprising him and potentially being exposed to allergens is so fucking funny. ilya who ends up also keeping an allergy-friendly household PURELY because it's just less stressful that way. meanwhile the motherfucker WITH the allergies is SO fucking casual about it that it wouldn't even occur to him to ask ilya to do that.

B. when they're pushing the friendship cover, ilya gets nudge nudge jokes about trying to copy what hollander's doing, and he's not going to share information shane didn't greenlight to get out, so he just plays along. and now there's like. at least three other players lowkey accidentally following an allergy diet because they don't know it's an allergy diet. why do hollander and now rozanov not eat tree nuts? unclear, but they're also the best two players in the entire industry so it's worth a shot to copy them.

@lucky-santangelo ilya only getting five seconds of feeling smug and holier than thou before shane puts him on blast is KILLING me XD

"i mean, you'd never made me food before. i didn't know i might need it."

"but you let me feed you food! you didn't say ANYTHING!"

"i mean you made them right in front of me. i watched. you didn't add anthing in i couldn't eat, and the chips were sealed and i've had that brand before."

"maybe i usually have peanuts in all of my containers! you do not know!"

"do you?"

"no"

"okay? so it's fine"

did not care about:

-being naked / fucking outside. especially in the dark this was not an issue i ever really thought too hard about

-locking doors. if someone was at my door they were already determined to get there. possibly this is different if your house is fancy and you're a celebrity but maybe not idk

things i DID care about

-garbage. you don't get garbage pickup rurally and have to haul it yourself. guessing shane hires someone to do this.

-LARGE wild animals. have you ever run from a bobcat? not fun

-hauling groceries that far w/ concern for frozen stuff. i had to get a cooler and ice every time i brought meat back.

-you can't do ANYTHINGGGG on short notice because it takes you an hour to get anywhere

They still cling to each other, but it's just as common to get kisses where they're both holding things (hockey gear, plates of food, etc) or have their hands in their pockets where the only thing touching each other is their lips.

And it's a whole other level of hedonistic affection. It drives both of them crazy that they can just have this.

They will be bickering back and forth, Ilya's hands full of hockey gear and Shane's hands in his pockets and then pause because Ilya just says "kiss" and they kiss and go right back to bickering. Only their lips have touched.

Gnat

Tough

Ilya buys him a red jumpsuit and is like, “PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!”

Cliff scores a goal, “Who’s a good dog??”

4 year old me: why must we do this

Fantastic old woman in the leopard print coat: "Why yes, my tooth IS real silver! Nobody ever asks me that. Do you like cats?"

“Shit! Rozanov, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean-.”

“I know.” Ilya quickly scoops his mother’s necklace and examines it. He sees that the clasp is broken. He looks up to tell Shane about the clasp that’s when he notices Shane’s heavy breathing. Shane’s hands are trembling and there are tears in his eyes. “Hollander, it is okay.”

Shane shakes his head. “No, I’ve ruined it.”

“Hey, it is fine, is just clasp. I broke it before. It is easy fix.” That’s a lie. Ilya has never broken his mother’s chain but Shane is on the verge of a panic attack and he needs to calm him down.

“Really?” Shane questions and Ilya nods. “Let me up.” Ilya moves off of Shane and watches as he goes over to his dresser. He looks through a box before going over to Ilya.

“I got this from a brand deal but I don’t really wear jewelry. You can use this until the chain gets fixed.” Shane offers Ilya the box. He opens it to find a thin gold chain staring back at him. Ilya carefully takes the cross off the broken chain and threads it onto the one Shane gave him. He asks Shane to put it on him and Shane happily obliges.

They wake up in the morning and it’s cold and their stiff from floor sleeping and ilya is laying on top of Shane, flopped over him. Shane wakes up with a groan, half because Ilya is On His Organs, but also because they’d had some beers around the small fire Shane had made last night, and he was a bit groggy and desperately needed a piss. Shane poking at Ilya’s hip, hand scratching at his back to wake him. Ilya wakes with a huff, half sitting up and he looks crazy, curls stuck down to one side of his head, squinting.

Ilya just stares stares stares at Shane as his brain is coming online and after a thick swallow, Shane gently pushing some strays curls out of Ilya’s eyes, thumb brushing his brow.

“Wow. We are alive. Bears didn’t eat us” Ilya exclaims after a moment, voice dry and low and rumbly.

Oh, no, Cliff's only loyalty is to Roz and that man is so blatantly in love with his husband to be.

Ilya Rozanov: Captain’s Log, day 25, our rations are slim. There is mere snickers bar and  bottle of gatorade between two of us.

Shane Hollander: Uh…it’s only been 25 minutes.

Give me young players throughout the league who had 1 season in Montreal before being traded who remember the captain that stayed after practice to help fine tune a particular skill. The captain that responded to the stupid 3am texts on game day because of course the rookies are set to bypass his do not disturb.

Maybe transitioning to Ottawa, to a new team, to just being #24 not the captain doesn’t go perfectly. They’re a great group of guys but they don’t know how to read him and he doesn’t know them outside of Ilya’s stories. Maybe he misses the things that go into being a Captain, the mentoring, the hard work, the extra hours.

Maybe he sees a rookie struggling with a skill and offers to stay after to help and is turned down (and now of course poor Luca thinks that Shane Hollander thinks he sucks and tells someone and now the entire team thinks he’s picking on the rookie which doesn’t exactly help thaw the ice between him and his new team) and shakes it off. And the team accepts that it’s Hollander, of course he thinks he’s better than everyone.

But then it happens. In San Fransisco, in Orlando, in New Jersey. Young players who come up to him on the ice before or after the game to say “thank you, Captain” and to say “did you see that move I did. The one we worked on”. And it keeps happening, people throughout the league, people who stayed in the cesspit that was Montreal’s locker room for 1-2 seasons saying “thank you, Captain”, saying we’re here for you.

And imagine the Centaur’s reactions. Because yes their new player is a bit closed off, is a generational talent, is almost untouchable sometimes. But he’s also someone who loves his team and loves the game. He wants to share his skills, he wants to mentor the next generation, he wants to be part of the team.

Ilya sees him standing there with the most adorably confused look on his face and walks over. He places both hands on his cheeks and smiles before kissing him, right there in front of everyone. The room erupts in hoots and hollers, Bood and Hayes yelling, “get a room!”

When they finally separate, Ilya gently rubs a thumb over Shane’s freckles. And with the most understanding expression, reassures Shane with a, “we are not the fucking Metros.”

The room gets loud again, Dykstra shouting, “fucking right! We’re the motherfucking Ottawa Centaurs!”

Shane finally cracks a smile. Throwing off his gloves he still had, he grabs his husband and literally dips Ilya right there, kissing him through their laughter and the riotous applause from their team.

Think of the shenanigans as they tried to get them together. Ilya might think it was a little bit sweet but he would also be humiliated because he is down bad but it's mutual! The pity would have him punching walls.