Chapter Text
Ottawa, 2014
Well-intended matchmaking was nothing new. Hayden and Jackie seemed to have met a nice, hot girl who would be perfect girlfriend material every week. J.J.'s own string of dates sometimes came with their own hot, single friends looking for a new fling. His mother really wasn't even so bad in comparison. Maybe it was a fit of temporary insanity (and maybe the months-long silence from "Lily" made certain topics burn worse than they usually did) because, in the middle of being told of another perfectly benign, probably lovely girl, Shane blurted out the only phrase that would without fail make his mother stop:
"Mom, I already have a girlfriend."
He'd thought better of it the second it left his mouth, but there was no way to take it back. Yuna's face had already lit up, and her voice was full of genuine delight when she said, "Shane, honey, that's wonderful. Tell me about her."
"There's not a lot to tell," he said, because there really wasn't a lot to tell about someone who didn't exist. But he had to say something, and once again his mouth moved without permission: "Her name's—" no, not that, but his mind was blank and he had to say something, "—um, Lily."
Fuck.
🏒
His mother, naturally, immediately wanted to meet “Lily,” and probably would have wanted her entire life story as well, but that was delayed by claiming that their relationship was too new for that sort of thing. His mom still wanted details about Lily-the-fake-girlfriend, though, and there was only so much demurring Shane could get away with without it being weird. Shane was a shit liar, but he was pretty sure he had heard that the best lies were supposed to be based on the truth in some way, so it turned out that Lily:
Liked hockey. (Obviously.) They’d met at a game (true.) She was pretty (maybe not the right word), and confident (understatement) and funny. Oh, and she was shy about the idea of media attention, so he wasn't telling most people about her yet, okay, mom?
It was probably obvious to Yuna that her son was dying inside having to talk about this, because after a few more minutes of interrogation, she let the topic drop. Probably her baby boy finally seeing someone was exciting enough for her that she was generously letting him off easy, even when she obviously still wanted to hear more. She was practically shining with happiness, and even though they had moved onto talking about his dad's latest gardening failure, her grin was wide and cheerful.
Shane felt like shit.
🏒
Living a couple hours away bought him more space from his new web of lies, but of course Yuna asked each week how things were going with Lily. Inevitably girlfriend-Lily grew into a tower of half-truths. She couldn't make it to the games even as often as his Ottawa-based parents, because she traveled often for work, even to America. Shane didn't really understand anything of what she did (total lie) but it was something tech-related, office-y. Outside of work? Well, she liked fashion (knew how to dress well, anyway) and cars (god they were awful) and had very strong opinions about drinks—
"She doesn't sound much like someone you would get along with," his mother had said. She was right. Something had shriveled up in his chest anyway.
"She— most people don't really get her," he had said, quietly. "But she's actually... really nice."
"I didn't mean anything bad by it, honey. I was just surprised."
Week by week, Yuna pulled more pieces of trivia about Lily out of Shane. Lily smoked, Shane disapproved. Lily's dietary habits were abominable. Lily wasn’t a native English speaker, though she was getting pretty good at it. Shane sometimes thought she acted kind of like a bitch because it was easier to brush people off than admit she couldn’t understand, and people kept judging her even when she did try. And she still managed to be funnier than Shane while speaking English anyway. He was worried about her. She didn’t like to talk about her family, and Shane hadn’t met them, but he knew there was something wrong back home. It was killing him that he couldn’t do anything about it, but the last time he tried pushing her about it, it had backfired terribly.
(It was natural, his mom said, that there were some things that were difficult to share even with your boyfriend. It wasn’t that Shane was doing anything wrong. Sometimes all you could do was let them know you would be there when they were ready to talk. And that was important, too.)
She was gorgeous. She was away for work, so often. He could see her over video (on TV) and he missed her way too fucking much. He’d seen her a couple times (games) but it wasn’t the same.
But that was just fake-girlfriend-Lily. Not someone real.
It was going on almost 6 months since Sochi.
🥅
Las Vegas, 2014
The offseason was here, and Shane had a problem. Fake-girlfriend-Lily traveled a lot, of course, but now that Shane had his summer free, surely they would be able to figure out a time when they were all home to meet Yuna and David. Who had so patiently been waiting to meet his girlfriend of, oh, several months? Wasn’t it meet-the-parents serious, by now?
Soon, Shane had said. He was probably going to have to break up with fake-girlfriend-Lily, but he hadn’t figured out what he was going to say. Or, well, he sort of had. Fake-girlfriend-Lily just traveled too much, and so did Shane. It was rough on both of them, and there weren’t any hard feelings but it just hadn’t been working out. He’d rewritten the script in his head so many times he could probably recite it in his sleep. But he hated the idea of disappointing his parents. And he was going to have to act, somehow, like he had just actually broken up with his totally real, serious girlfriend.
He’d already put it off too long, though. Shane promised himself he was going to actually do it once he got back home. No more delaying.
🏒
The awards ceremony sucked. Ilya Rozanov was such a fucking asshole. And Shane was being pathetic and thinking about how he hadn’t kissed his no-strings, casual hookup. It was stupid and he knew it.
He called his mom and got about halfway through his breakup script before he just started crying.
So that was one problem solved, at least.
🥅
Montreal, 2016
It was Shane's fault for not picking a different fake name, two years ago. He had thought he's gotten away with it, but after the game his parents had wanted to get dinner with not only him but Hayden and Jackie as well. He was glad they liked the Pikes, really. Normally he would have said he was grateful the people he loved got along.
But then his mom had said, "You should give it a shot, Shane. I mean, you haven't seriously dated someone since Lily."
Hayden visibly perked up like a hound catching the scent. "Lily? Your mom knows about Lily?"
Shane, oh so eloquently, said, “Um.” And then tried to remember about a thousand lies he had told two years ago and thought he would never need to use again, in the space of about two seconds.
"Why wouldn't I know about Shane's girlfriend?" his mom said, bemused.
"Girlfriend!" Hayden practically crowed. "You said it was nothing serious! Come on, man, why wouldn't you tell me?"
"It really isn't," Shane said, weakly.
But it was Jackie who noticed the flaw: "Mrs. Hollander, what do you mean since Lily? I didn’t realize they’d broken up."
"I told you, Jackie, Yuna is fine," said Yuna, who probably wanted a Jackie-clone as a daughter-in-law and would settle for best-friend-in-law-in-law for now. Really, Jackie was great, Shane couldn’t blame her.
"It's really not like that," Shane said.
"No, you literally saw her two weeks ago! In Boston!" said Hayden.
"I thought you broke up two years ago? And what do you mean, in Boston?"
That was when, thankfully, an idea finally struck. "Yeah, um, we did. Break up, I mean," said Shane. "She traveled a lot for work, and then she got relocated. To Boston. So, um, we met up while I was there, but she doesn't want to do long-distance. So it was just, um, casual."
"Aw, man, that sucks," said Hayden, almost exactly as his mom said, "oh, honey." Jackie was frowning, and belatedly Shane realized they were probably all about to start an intervention on either failing to get over his ex or convincing her to commit.
He looked pleadingly at his dad, who was peaceably eating his lasagna. David Hollander looked around the table, obviously contemplating abandoning him to the vultures, before taking pity and using a conversational grenade: asking for baby pictures. Yuna raised an eyebrow at the blatant distraction, but Hayden was already pulling out his phone. Mentally, Shane awarded his dad Father of the Year. And started drafting a new fake timeline of events for fake-girlfriend-Lily, because this was only a temporary reprieve. And if he was going to fool both his parents and Hayden and Jackie, the fake-girlfriend-Lily story was going to have to be bulletproof.
🏒
His mother was more careful around the subject, this time, but the Lily inquisition began again. It was mostly just a fake-casual and how’s Lily? added to all their usual catching up. Shane could have said they weren't really talking, except that they were absolutely texting still, and Hayden knew it. He could have come up with a new pack of total lies, but he knew well enough he wouldn’t be able to keep up with that. So his mom asked how things were going with Lily and Shane... told her.
He liked Lily. A lot. More than he should, since they weren't really seriously dating now. She was still beautiful and confident and funny. He didn't think she was really seriously seeing anyone, but she also definitely... seeing people. He knew the obvious answer was to just stop, to just find someone else, to do anything but keep texting her... but he couldn't seem to help it.
His mom listened, and hugged him, and didn't tell him he was being stupid even though he obviously was. It was nice.
🏒
Hayden and Jackie, meanwhile, seemed to alternate between gently bringing up more of their single, in Montreal, willing to actually commit to a relationship friends, and poking at the Lily-situation. But they backed off when Shane said he wasn’t interested in meeting someone right now pretty easily. Jackie offered to share her WAG-patented advice on how to make long-distance work, which Shane politely declined. He appreciated that they wanted to help, but he wasn’t looking for anything and he would just have to deal with The Lily Thing himself.
It was closer to the truth than anything he’d ever said about relationships to them was in years.
🥅
Montreal, November 2016
Rose Landry was amazing. Not because she was beautiful, not because she was a literal movie star who was somehow also a hockey fan, not because she was charming and funny and real. She was amazing because she was the first girl Shane had ever thought maybe this is how it’s supposed to feel.
It was the first he had felt maybe normal in a long, long time.
Shane wasn’t stupid. He knew dating girls didn’t make it like he had never slept with a man. He could marry a girl— Rose, not Rose, whoever it ended up being— have kids, the whole nine yards, and he would never be fully straight. But it wasn’t like there was a way to know whether he was 100% gay, either, without trying. There were a million kinds of people; maybe most people were 100% straight, and some people were 100% gay, but there were plenty of in-betweens. Sure, probably most bisexual people were totally 50/50 for men and women, but that wasn’t everyone. Weren’t there those people who went decades thinking they were 100% straight, only to meet someone who was their one exception? There had to be people who were like that in reverse, or who were more 80/20 than 50/50. When he was in middle school one of his second cousins who had only dated men for years started seriously dating a woman and had said she was still straight, somehow. He didn’t know what she’d call herself these days, having been literally married to a woman for over a decade, but the point was the same.
It had never worked out with his high school girlfriends, sure, but to be honest he was a wreck socially in other ways too and had sort of agreed to date a couple girls just because it seemed like the thing to do. How many people worked out with their own high school girlfriends, anyway? It had been years, and he could barely remember how it had felt, but had it really been that bad?
So, Rose. He liked her. He couldn’t compare how he felt about her to how other people felt about their girlfriends, but he felt so fucking happy around her. He thought she was beautiful. He liked kissing her, he liked going on dates with her. Maybe it was actually going to work.
🥅
Montreal, December 2016
Then they had spectacularly bad sex.
🥅
Montreal, January 2017
So it wasn’t really working.
He’d thought about it. He couldn’t stop thinking about it. It wasn’t like regular people couldn’t just have bad sex. But he was only so good at lying to himself. Maybe, if the only experiences he had to work off of were his high school girlfriends and the couple girls between then and Rose, he could fool himself better. He hadn’t wanted to think about those days much, but now that he really tried to remember…
It had sucked. Not in a funny innuendo way. The first time he’d tried to go all the way with a girl he’d had a fucking panic attack, how had he forgotten that? She’d been far too nice about it, probably thought he was just a nervous virgin and not gay, but it had happened and he’d just forgotten. He’d gotten by well enough the next time, but he’d mostly been relieved that it had worked. Who was relieved they lost their virginity? How was he this fucking stupid?
It hadn’t been all that bad. He’d even say he’d sort of enjoyed himself, a couple of times. He had also been a little drunk, those times. Which had even been a little bit of a good excuse why some things had been, well, a little difficult. God, who was he kidding?
All that, and he could still, almost convince himself it wasn’t like that. Except that he had counter-examples. Here he was, trying to find the good parts of his experiences with women, when if you asked him the same thing about men he would have to stop to figure out which parts were just good and which ones were fucking amazing. Thinking about it too long he would start to feel it spreading through him, need to stop before it got out of control. He had never felt like that with a woman, and he was starting to think— starting to let himself believe— that maybe he never would.
He knew what that meant. He knew it made him a dick, to string Rose along like that if he actually, finally understood this about himself. Except each time he saw her, he remembered all the reasons he liked her, and he thought no, maybe, and then he fooled himself just long enough to go home and remember what an asshole he actually was.
🥅
Ottawa, January 2017
It was only in the evening, after the dinner dishes were all put away and the TV was buzzing with a program no one was actually watching, that his mom brought it up.
"Honey," she said, "is everything really going okay?"
"Of course, mom, why wouldn't it be?"
"It's just," Yuna let out a sigh before grasping his hand, "I don't want to pry. And if you're happy, I'm happy. You seemed so excited when you first met Rose, and she seems like a lovely girl. But you haven't talked about her at all tonight except when I first asked, and, well... you never seemed like you were really over Lily. So I wondered."
He couldn't help flinching. "No, mom, I... Rose is really great. I really like her."
"I never said you didn't. And if I'm wrong then ignore me. But it's okay to feel how you feel. It wasn't wrong to try dating someone new, but it's only natural things don't work out sometimes. And it isn't fair to you or Rose if you just try to ignore how you're really feeling. I know you like her, but... after the first couple of weeks, the way you talk about her-- it's not how you sound when you talk about Lily. And you just haven't seemed happy lately."
"I... mom, it's really been fine."
"Shane, baby, I want things to be better than fine. I want you to be happy. Really happy. And it just seems like you aren't."
"I know, mom, but I'm not going to get back together with Lily."
"I didn't say you should. But baby, you have to know, when you used to talk about her... you just sounded so in love. And I want that for you, whoever it ends up being with."
Shane could feel his face cracking, the smile too heavy to support. Was that really what it seemed like? It wasn't like he could ever see from the outside, what he was like with "Lily." It wasn't love. It couldn't be love.
"Mom, it really isn't like that with Lily," he said. "Because—"
His mom, instead of looking sympathetic like she had been so far, started to look truly alarmed. Shane could feel the tears welling up, and panic right on their heels. His voice was already cracking. Fuck, this was embarrassing.
"Because...?" his mom tried to prompt him, and instead Shane just burst into tears. "Because," he said, gasping, and then he couldn't breathe—
"Hey, hey," his mom said, "it's okay, honey, just breathe, okay?"
He tried to, shuddering with sobs, and it was only sort of working. His mom was hugging him, and running her hand down his back, and he felt like a giant idiot.
"Shane, whatever it is, I love you no matter what, okay? We'll figure it out."
God, he was an idiot, and pathetic, and he wanted to crawl into the floor and die, but he also thought if he didn't say something now he might never and that would be so much worse, so with the last scraps of feeble bravery he had he said, "she'snotagirl."
Yuna Hollander blinked once, twice, deciphering what her son had just said before it finally clicked.
"Okay. Okay, baby, that's fine. I love you, I mean it. It's okay."
For an embarrassingly long time, Shane let himself sob into his mom's arms, rocking him like a baby and not a grown adult having a stupid breakdown in his childhood home. Eventually, he calmed down enough to just be a gross, snotty mess, but one that was breathing evenly at least. "Sorry," he said, automatically.
"Don't be sorry," said his mom. "Shane, look at me."
He didn't particularly want to—even if his face hadn't been gross and blotchy and snotty and teary, he couldn't really stand to do it— but his mom was guiding his face to look at her anyway.
"None of that— nothing like that could ever matter to me. I love you, and I am so, so proud of you. If the person that you love is a man, all I care about is that you love him. And I love you and that's never going to change, understand me?"
"Even if he's a man?" Shane couldn't help but repeat, voice small.
"Even if he's a man."
"Even if..." a small amount of humor returned to him, "he's a Raiders fan?"
Yuna's face stayed deadly serious as she said, "Even if he's a Raiders fan." And somehow, with that, Shane could feel that she really meant it. And a smile was spreading across his face, and it was cliche but there really was a weight lifting off his shoulders.
"But he's not actually a Raiders fan, though, right?" his mom said, jokingly.
Shane's face must have twitched the wrong way, though, because, well...
"Shane!"
He collapsed into semi-hysterical giggles at his mom’s outraged face, and a beat later his mom started laughing as well, the kind of laughter that was more than half relief.
He had said his most terrible secret, and the world wasn’t ending. It almost felt like it might be starting, instead.
🥅
The Next Day
Probably, if it were revealed that "Lily" was a Raiders fan (sort of) after any other conversation, his mom would have jokingly pretended to disown him. As it was, she very grumpily said that it was fine. She supposed. If that was how it was going to be. His mom had asked him if he wanted to tell his dad, or for her to tell him, or to wait, but as it turned out the man had been awkwardly hovering after leaving the bathroom trying not to interrupt and failing not to eavesdrop.
David Hollander also did not care if his son was in love with a man, and he actually genuinely did not care if said man was a Raiders fan, because he was the sane one of the family.
Somewhat embarrassingly, his parents had apparently wondered before if he was gay. More ironically, the reason they hadn’t wondered lately was “Lily.” There was, however, the awkward attempt to bridge the “Lily” they knew with the real life man. “Lily” was not, in fact, a Quebecois-speaking, Montreal-based office worker in tech who had been relocated to Boston. Not that Shane intended to tell them that, because he had no explanation for why he had made up that lie without saying he was actually a Russian hockey player who played for Boston (no guesses needed for who that might be). He could admit that he and “Lily” had never been anything official, and “Lily” had actually never lived in Montreal.
Most of it really was actually true: Lily liked hockey. They had met at a game. Lily liked cars. Lily liked fashion: “I don’t know, mom, he wears actual outfits and not just athleisure all the time, does that count?” Some of it, Shane didn’t even have to explain. Lily was “shy” about media attention for very obvious reasons; Lily’s family situation was worrying because they were, probably, homophobic assholes.
It was all the things he hadn’t even come close to implying that were being dragged out into the sunlight now. Shane had never even tried for a serious relationship with another man, because it just wouldn’t work. (No, his mom had said, no that’s sad. Thanks, mom, he hadn’t realized.) That “Lily” had tried to make it… more than it had been, and he had freaked out, and just left. And they hadn’t talked since.
Lily could make it work with someone else. Lily was bisexual, Lily could meet a nice girl and have a family and not have be alone or pretend in order to be happy.
“But,” his mom said, “you said he was the one who wanted to make it a serious relationship.”
“I don’t know what he actually wants,” Shane said. “There’s a big difference between just, um… That. And a serious relationship.”
“Well, then, maybe you should ask him,” said his dad.
It didn’t make sense. Why would he choose staying in the dark with Shane, when he could have any girl he wanted?
“Love doesn’t have to make sense,” was his mother’s opinion, which was irrelevant, because Ilya Rozanov was not in love with him. But Shane at least owed him an apology for how he had left things last time. So maybe he would hear him out.
🥅
Montreal, January
Shane had no fucking clue how to break up with someone. Almost all his former girlfriends had broken up with him, after he just hadn’t made enough of an effort, or he’d broken up with them for an obvious reason like moving. How did he tell her he just didn’t like her that way, without telling her he was gay so really that was totally his fault?
“You’re really great,” he had said, lamely, “and I really like you a lot.” Rose had smiled and said, “But?”
“But, um. I was trying to get over someone else, and it didn’t work. I’m sorry. I should have told you sooner.”
“No, I get it,” she said, “It’s really okay.”
Really, it was going about as well as Shane could have hoped for. He was worried there would be more hysterics. Or was that sexist? He figured getting dumped was a perfectly good reason to have some hysterics, though. Rose, however, was eerily prepared for this conversation.
More than Shane realized, even.
“Can I ask you something… personal?” she said.
“Sure,” he said, because that was probably the least he owed her. Even if he also was thinking do not ask me who I am trying to get over.
“The person you’re trying to get over…” she started before trailing off. Fuck, shit, no, Shane thought. “Are they…” she started again, before clearing her throat, and Shane suddenly noticed the words she was using: not her. Or girl.
She seemed to notice the deer-in-the-headlights look he was making, because she backtracked. “You really don’t have to tell me! I just thought, maybe… it might not have been, you know… a girl.”
Shane didn’t think he could bring himself to say it out loud, again. But Rose was Rose, and he was pretty sure she wouldn’t tell anyone. And he wanted to be able to tell her. So he nodded. It was tiny, but it was a nod.
🏒
A few minutes later, he had a thought. Rose had clearly already thought he might be gay. And sure, the sex had been bad, but… “Was it really that bad?”
Rose giggled. “It kind of was. Sorry.”
At least her theater school gay ex boyfriend stories made him feel like a little bit less of an asshole.
🥅
January, Montreal
Jane: Can we talk after the game?
🏒
Rozanov— Ilya— could probably tell this was going to be different. For one, Shane had sent the address to his apartment. He hadn’t said anything remotely flirty beforehand. Ilya, a little to his surprise, hadn’t tried to start anything either.
Shane felt like he was going to vibrate out of his skin as he let Ilya into the apartment as fast as possible. Then he had no idea where to sit, or stand, even though it was his own damn apartment. Normally he would be dragging them towards the bedroom as soon as possible.
Ilya seemed to have settled on leaning against his kitchen island. He looked good. It was incredibly odd to see him inside Shane’s home, in a way that was doing something he probably shouldn’t name to his heart.
“I owe you an apology,” Shane said. “For the way I left last time.”
“Is okay,” said Ilya, although his face didn’t seem to agree.
“It’s not,” said Shane. “I freaked out, but I should have at least said something. At least after I calmed down, and I didn’t. So I’m sorry.”
“Okay,” said Ilya. Compared to his usual self, he looked lost. “Apology accepted.”
For a minute they just stared at each other. Ilya, Shane was finally noticing, looked rough. Like he hadn’t been sleeping. Maybe he was making assumptions, but there was a distinctly guilty feeling rising in him that it might be his fault.
“Rose and I broke up,” Shane finally blurted out. “Because, I’m, um.”
It was pretty bad he was having trouble saying I’m gay to the man he had been sleeping with for, what, seven years? Had it really been that long? It was sort of startling how quickly Ilya’s posture slumped after Shane had said he and Rose broke up, but now Ilya was raising an eyebrow at him and Shane had the distinct feeling he was being laughed at.
“Because I’m gay. Shut up, it’s not funny.” It’s a little bit funny said Ilya’s face. “I mean, like, 100%, completely gay. Not like you.”
“Okay. So you are gay,” said Ilya. “So what?”
“I’m just trying to explain,” said Shane. “Last time was different. And I freaked out about it, because I didn’t want to admit that, but it was.”
“Sure. It was different. But what do you want, Hollander?”
God, Shane didn’t know. He wanted the world to be less shitty so they could go outside holding hands and have it not be a big deal. He wanted that to also be something Ilya wanted. He had no fucking idea what Ilya really wanted, though, and he was still afraid to ask. “Shane. I want you to at least call me Shane, in private, I think we’ve known each other long enough for that.”
“Fine. Shane. So you broke up with Rose. What do you want from me?”
“I want…” I want literally everything. Anything you’re willing to give me. “I want this to mean something. More than just sex.”
“That is a terrible idea.” It was, and that also was not an I do not want that.
“I know it is,” said Shane. “But it’s what I want. I’m not saying we should be shouting it from the rooftops. I just can’t pretend I don’t like you anymore.”
“We can’t,” said Ilya.
“Tell me it’s not what you want and I’ll shut up about it,” said Shane. Please don’t tell me that.
“It is not about want. We can’t. Please, Shane, stop asking.”
“Okay,” Shane said. “Okay, I get it. Look, I’m not asking for anything crazy. I don’t want other people knowing anything, either! I just don’t get it. Last time, it seemed like you wanted… something, I don’t know. Why are you so against it meaning anything now?”
Ilya was quiet, fiddling with his necklace, before he said: “I could not go home. If anyone found out, I would not be able to go home.”
In the space of about five minutes, Shane learned more about Ilya’s family than he had in the entire decade before. A family of cops. Too-young now-dead mothers and stepmothers. Alzheimer’s. God. Shane could tell there was something wrong, before, just a little, but he hadn’t really thought of it beyond Russia. It was not just Russia. It was stupid, because they were the same age, but hearing this kind of thing made Shane feel young. Naive, maybe. Like he was some kid who thought of families like little stick-figure-crayon drawings in front of identical square houses, and was just finding out not everyone had a mom and dad who loved them the way they were supposed to.
He didn’t know what to do with the awful feelings welling up in him, a sadness that, what, he hadn’t been magically able to fix Ilya’s family when they were just boys on different continents who had never even met each other? He felt entirely helpless in the face of problems he knew there was nothing he could do to fix, even as they were hurting one of the people he cared about most.
He settled for holding Ilya as tightly as he could, like that could possibly make up for all the things Shane had been missing the whole time they had known each other. Ilya clung back onto him even harder, and Shane realized that there was at least one thing he could do, because it seemed no one else had been holding him the way he needed, either.
It wasn’t enough, but at the same time, it had to be.
🏒
The sex was at least still really fucking awesome.
(He kind of liked being able to hold Ilya afterwards even better, though.)
🥅