Chapter Text
Shane hears the locker room door slam behind him. He won’t cry. He won't give them the satisfaction, even though he's the only one in the hall and no one from the team can see him. He's not running, but he's definitely speed-walking to the elevator that will take him down to the parking garage. He wants to be gone before any of the others have a chance to get to their cars. He wants to go home, shower, and be alone with the strange sensation that he can’t name until Ilya manages to escape the Centaurs’ celebrations and call him. Shane has a sinking feeling that this is his last time leaving Centre Bell and that he should really slow down and look around, but the need to rush home and get out of the sweaty clothes he still hasn’t taken off is winning out. He reaches the elevator in record time and repeatedly jabs the "down" button, even though his rational mind knows this won't make the elevator come any faster.
"Fuck," Shane says to the elevator door as it dings and opens, fighting the urge to laugh out loud as he steps inside. He knows he’s getting giddy from the anxiety that this clusterfuck of a night has given him, and his thoughts are a mess. His chest still feels tight, and his teeth feel weird - the temporary crown from the tooth he chipped in Game 1 is loose, and he keeps poking it with his tongue. His arm is hurting again. He got slammed into the boards a bit too hard by Troy Barrett in Game 6, and while he has swallowed enough painkillers to keep it at bay since then, the pain has not gone away. Now, after the ill-fated Game 7 is done and dusted, the pain is back with a vengeance. Shane is feeling every year of his age and then some. The buzzer at the end of the game seems to have shaken everything loose in his body, including all the little (and medium) pains he has been successfully ignoring during the playoffs.
As he exits the elevator, Shane has to stop and move his bag strap to his right shoulder because his left arm feels tingly, as if he has pinched a nerve. He opens and closes his fist, but the feeling persists. He makes a mental note to get a massage (from a professional, not Ilya, as the latter's efforts seem to mostly just help with lower body tension no matter where they start out). He wishes his parents could have made it here to pick him up, but Mom caught the flu, so he told them that he’d see them later once she recovers. He's not sure if he's happy they're not here to see him falling apart or upset there's no one here to hug him. He’ll get one from Ilya when he sees him again (and probably much more than a hug), but right now, he would kill for someone - anyone - to come over and give him a hug.
Shane gets a weird look from the security guard in the little booth perched in the middle of the player and staff parking lot and realizes he has stared at him for a moment too long. He fights the urge to laugh again. Hugging a random security guard to get over the fact that his life is disintegrating, that will definitely add some fuel to all the headlines that are probably being written this very second about his traitorous fall. He can see it now - "Shane Hollander Forces Awkward Hug on Horrified Security Guard After Heartbreaking Playoff Loss!" He misjudges a step and almost reenacts his earlier fall on the ice but catches himself just in time. He throws his bag in the trunk and slams it a bit too hard. His mind supplies another headline - "7 Moments When Shane Hollander Took Anger to a New Level: A Look at His Most Outrageous Slams from Doors to Trunks!" What the fuck is wrong with his brain today and all the damn headlines? Shane's mind gives him a mental middle finger and blares "Breaking News: Shane Hollader's Mind Spins Out Of Control, Headlines Become His Only Language!" at him as he stifles a hysterical giggle.
Shane unlocks the car door and throws himself into the driver’s seat. Ilya’s empty takeout coffee cup is still in the console. For some reason, this makes his eyes finally tear up. Everything swims out of focus for a moment, and it feels like something snaps in his chest. Not literally, of course, but he could have sworn he felt something pop. He hasn’t seen one of those tubes of dough from the supermarket in ages due to keeping processed foods out of his diet, but it feels like one has popped open right inside his chest. The one where you pull a little strip of paper and it just explodes out of the cardboard casing and you can’t stuff it back in, he thinks. Just like he can’t put back what he has heard in the locker room into a neat container and close it away. The metaphorical dough feels like it’s filling up his lungs and taking his breath away. His chest feels even tighter and his heart feels like it will explode. He doesn't need a panic attack now. But maybe this is the best place to have it—it's not like he wants to talk to Hayden or J.J. now; his dad is probably making his mom some chicken soup, and Ilya is celebrating a well-deserved victory that shouldn't be ruined by his self-pity. He'll have a panic attack all by himself like a big boy and then go home and have a one-man pity party.
Shane closes his eyes and tries to remember the familiar breathing exercise: in for four, hold, out for six. In for four, hold, and out for six. He should visualize a little ball moving up and down in a predictable arc, up and down, or something, and he tries to do that, his hand on his chest as if it's trying to hold back the imaginary dough from bursting out of him. For a moment, the ball bounces smoothly as he breathes in and out at a steady pace, but suddenly the ball in his mind speeds up and plummets to the ground. Shane frowns and tries again, but the ball (just like his breath) just flops around erratically. The breaths feel stuck in his lungs, and he feels like he’s trying to suck in a watermelon through a straw whenever he tries to breathe in. Slow breathing isn't happening, so he tries breathing faster, but something twinges in his chest, and his breaths crash into each other, losing any semblance of speed and rhythm.
Shane’s eyes fly open, and he desperately tries to remember where his phone is. He needs to call someone- Ilya, Mom, Hayden - hell, even Comeau will do at this moment because something is very wrong. His phone - he needs to think about his phone, but he can’t remember where it’s gone, as his chest suddenly feels like Troy has smashed him into the boards all over again even though all he's doing is sitting in the car. Shane finally lets himself panic, as this is not how this is all supposed to end. He can’t let this, whatever this is, steal away their future. He needs to talk to Ilya, to tell him how much he loves him one more time. He must have thrown the phone into his bag in anger as he stormed out, and his bag is in the trunk, so it may as well be in Ottawa. Something painfully digs into Shane’s palm, and he realizes that he's still holding his car keys. He can’t reach the phone, but maybe he can get help.
He doesn’t know if he'll make it in time, but he needs to try for himself - for Ilya - as he can’t even send a message to him or anyone else now. This is just a boring Land Rover and not a plane with a missing engine, but something in him knows that he's in exactly the same state of mind that Ilya was when he didn’t know if they'd land safely. He grips the key in his fist and tries to blindly jam it into the ignition as his vision starts to dim. Just when his hand begins to weaken and the key starts slipping, he makes one last effort and the key slots in. Shane twists it, and the engine sputters to life. Shane smashes his foot on the gas pedal, and the car lurches forward, scraping against someone’s unevenly parked rust bucket as it tries to get out of the parking spot, tires squealing as everything around him goes dark.
The last thing Shane remembers clearly is thinking that maybe this isn't a panic attack after all.