you know what is real

Aaron: I’m not buying this lovey-dovey shit. What do you REALLY want from my brother?

Neil: I wanted a short blonde asshole, but you were already taken.

Aaron: I’m serious, Josten!

Neil: Fine. The idea of not being with him makes me rethink my decision not to take over the Butcher family business & chop people up for fun.

Aaron: …Do you have a less psychotic reason?

"Look how tiny she was!", Hayden texts, followed by another handful of pictures of teeny tiny Amber. And Shane loves his nices and nephew, has always cherished that he gets to be Uncle Shane to them and watch them grow up.

"Cute!", Shane texts back before he scrolls through the pictures one by one. It has been ages and at the same time five minutes since Amber, now gap-toothed and, last Shane saw her, wearing a mud soaked bumblebee dress as she was kneeling in the garden orchestrating a tea party for the frogs in the Pike's pond, was barely old enough to hold up her own head.

A new message from Hayden comes through, though this time it's a video. It's taken from outside Amber's nursery, the hallway dark. The soft light from her various nightlights offers just enough to show the outline of Shane, holding Amber in his arms and swaying slowly from side to side as he's singing softly in French.

"Teething gate!!", Hayden writes. "Saved my ass back then, only thing that got us through that evening. Still a legend for busting out the singing, bud."

And yeah, Shane remembers. He'd come over to help Hayden with the kids, giving Jackie a break now that her husband was back from his roadie, allowing her to get a full nights sleep again. He remembers the bone deep exhaustion when nothing they tried helped with soothing Amber. He remembers Hayden, close to tears, heading downstairs to get one of the teething rings they kept in the freezer in the hope that maybe this time it would help soothe her pain. And Shane had stood there, holding a softly hiccuping Amber in his arms, heart breaking for her and wanting nothing more than to take the pain away.

And suddenly he'd remembered his dad holding him in his arms when he couldn't sleep, mind too loud and running a mile a minute even as a kid, carrying him through their house and singing softly to him.

Shane didn't realize until now that Hayden had recorded him singing.

He's brought back to the present by Ilya nudging his thigh with his foot. "What are you watching?", Ilya asks, his own phone lowered to his chest.

Shane can already feel his cheeks heat up. It's not as if he makes a habit of singing and he's pretty sure he has never sung near Ilya, let alone told him about it.

"Nothing", Shane says quickly. He knows it's to no avail when Ilya raises his eyebrows at him.

"You have been starring at your phone for past ten minutes. Looks very interesting for video about nothing", Ilya says.

And so Shane ends up showing the video to Ilya. He has heard him anyway and there's this curious glint in his eyes that Shane knows well enough by now. He's not going to let it go so might as well go full in.

Ilya's eyes light up when he realises that it's Shane who's singing, in French no less. He insists on watching the video three more times and begs Shane to send it to him afterwards.

Of course, he also looks up the original song. "It's a good song, but you have much prettier voice than her", Ilya tells him after listening to the tong for the first time, leaning up to kiss his jaw. Shane pulls him close, hand automatically finding Ilya's curls as he makes himself comfortable on Shane's shoulder. He kisses Ilya's forehead, listening as the song starts anew.

They listen to it in silce for a while before Ilya asks, "Why this song?"

And, well.

"My parents played it once when I was over at their house for dinner", Shane starts. Well aware that Ilya will want to know more than that, Shane tries not to focus on how fast his heart is beating as he continues. "It's, uhm, a love song. It's an old song, the singer sings about how she misses her husband when he is out at sea, watching the storms that pass by. She always waits at the shore, watching as the boats come back in, looking for the boat where the sunshine illuminates her husband's blonde curls, bringing him and the sunshine back to her."

Shane resolutely stares at the point just above the TV as he mumbles the last part, cheeks aflame.

Ilya sits up from he was resting against Shane, softly taking his chin in his hands to turn Shane so he's facing Ilya.

Ilya waggles with his eyebrows. "I did not realize you were so in love with handsome blonde sailor, Hollander", he teases, laughing as Shane shoves him away with an eye-roll and a "Fuck off, asshole!"

They both know there's no heat behind either statement, not when Shane immediately pulls Ilya close to him again and Ilya lays his head back on his shoulder, pressing a soft kiss to Shane's throat as he does so.

Shane knows Ilya has long put one and one together, has figured out why Shane might have been drawn to a song about waiting for your loved one to return to you. Has figured out why Shane would sing a song about a man with blond curly hair. Knows they both remember when waiting meant months and sweing each other for a handful of hours, a couple of days if they were lucky. Feels it in the way Ilya presses against him, the way he himself holds Ilya close with no intent of letting him go soon.

Again, it's Ilya who breaks the silence. "Shane?", he asks, quiet and without a note of teasing in his voice. "Would you sing it to me? My song?"

And Shane has never been able to withold Ilya anything he asks for. Neither of them mention the fact that Ilya called it his song. After all, the song had been Ilya's long before Ilya had become Shane's.

THE LAST.

When Kevin retires because his game is starting to decline (age is catching up with him) and the chronic pain in his hand becomes unbearable, Andrew contemplates suicide to spare Kevin the satisfaction of seeing him be the last to retire.

Seven years earlier it had been Boyd, though Andrew didn't care at all. Five years earlier, Moreau ended his career to become the head coach at USC, replacing James Rhemann. Jeremy Moreau ended his career three years earlier to be with his daughters and husband, though he was far from retired (apparently, Jeremy was now a famous activist and surfing champion). Neil retired two years earlier after breaking his leg in an illegal play. Although he didn't suffer permanent damage, his 39 years and the long rehabilitation indicated that he would never again be the fastest on the court.

After extremely difficult months, Neil decided to leave the Exy when he was offered a job as a sports commentator.

He was a pain, the players' nightmare, and one of the most-watched commentators in the United States.

And then there was Kevin.

Andrew, somehow, was the last one left.

Andrew could have retired. It was over. It was all finished.

He was the most decorated goalkeeper in the world of exy, the one the new generations aspired to be. He had two damn Olympic medals and countless trophies. Andrew hated those accolades and wasn't planning on getting any more.

He could have retired, yes.

How the hell had he ended up being the last idiot in exy if he didn't even want to play?

When Andrew told Kevin, Kevin almost had a heart attack because, apparently, Andrew's age hadn't affected his game at all.

So Andrew tried to make his game worse. He slowed down. He trained less. He decided to laze around in goal whenever he felt like it. He pretended to be too old to keep up with everyone else.

But his reflexes betrayed him. Besides, he was addicted to the looks of disappointment and hatred he received when, breaking through the defensive line, Andrew crushed the opposing team's hopes by preventing their goals. The more hopeful the opposing team was, the more Andrew enjoyed watching them crumble.

No, no.

Andrew had to stop immediately.

If lowering his performance and simply announcing his retirement didn't work, there was one more thing he could do: sabotage his own career.

So, at a press conference, someone asked Andrew how he was going to relax after the game, and Andrew replied:

"I'm going home to my… husband."

Andrew and Neil weren't married. Andrew and Neil would have hurt each other's feelings before referring to each other as "husband," but it was the quickest way to get the message across.

After a brief silence, Andrew persisted.

"My husband, Neil Josten, the loudmouth addicted to exy"

The world went crazy.

Neil was live on air when Andrew dropped the bombshell. The cameras captured his reaction. Andrew spent the next few hours enjoying watching Neil's face go from paralysis to disbelief, and then to a gaping mouth for a few seconds of absolute silence. His first words when he regained his voice were: "We're going to commercials… No, shut up and cut it NOW!"

Andrew made a sticker with Neil's face and some GIFs that he used to mock him.

The first thing Neil said to him was: "You could have warned me sooner." And the first thing Andrew replied: "I thought dropping uncomfortable truths live on air was your thing. Or have you lost your sense of humor, you old fool?"

Then someone said: "I hate you to the very marrow of my bones" and the romantic conversation ended there, because they moved on to more pleasant things.

Andrew didn't answer Kevin when he called, nor Aaron's incredulous question ("Husband? Tell me Neil isn't my brother-in-law, Andrew. Tell me, damn it!"), nor Nicky's tearful voice messages telling him how proud she was of him.

He simply waited for his career to fall apart. Finally.

When his agent called the next day, Andrew was almost pleased. Almost.

When she told him he was getting support from the entire fanbase, his team, the whole sports world, and that, apparently, he was now a symbol, Andrew stuck the phone in the oven.

He had to restrain himself from sticking his head in it too.

"You had to say you were retiring, you know?" Neil said.

Andrew slowly turned his head toward him, crudely imitating the girl from The Exorcist.

Neil bit his lip and tried not to laugh.