Chapter Text
Shane shook out the shirt that he had already re-folded twice with more force than he knew was necessary. Instead of folding it for a third time, he wrung it between his hands, staring at his suitcase so he wouldn’t have to look at JJ. Having to hide had never felt as unfair as it had over the past 12 hours since he had learned about the emergency landing of Ilya’s plane.
Hiding until the end of their careers had always seemed like the only path he and Ilya could take. What felt like an eternity ago now, his mother had said it was sad they’d have to hide for such a long time, but Shane thought she was really the one who would understand the most that it was the only option. It had felt more and more difficult and impossible over the past months, maybe the past year, but Shane still couldn’t see another path.
It felt like yesterday had fundamentally changed things.
If things had turned out differently, Shane wouldn’t have been able to hide anymore. If Ilya had died, he knew he wouldn’t have made it off the team bus without breaking down, and everyone would have known immediately. If Ilya had been hurt, he wouldn’t have hesitated to get that rental car and drive all the way down to Florida. Though he wondered if he would’ve been allowed to see Ilya, if anyone would’ve given him any information at all. No one on Ilya’s team knew about them, no one would think that Shane had a reason to ask any questions, that he had a right to know anything at all.
Shane closed his eyes tightly and shook his head. Ilya was fine. He had seen him, they had talked, Ilya had sent him a very filthy picture in the middle of the night. Shane hadn’t been able to sleep anyway, so they had spent hours talking afterwards, keeping each other company through a night that would’ve otherwise been filled with nightmares.
“Shane?” JJ’s voice pulled him out of his spiraling thoughts, and Shane blinked, dumbfounded, when JJ carefully pulled the shirt out of his grip and started to fold it himself.
Shane looked at his friend, and for the first time since all of this with Ilya had started, Shane didn’t care if telling anyone would end his career. Weeks ago, Ilya had asked him if he’d choose Ilya over hockey, and the answer had been clear then, even though Shane had been too angry about the whole argument to say it aloud. Now he wished he could just scream it to the whole world that he would always choose Ilya without a single doubt.
So, Shane made a decision.
“Sit down,” he told JJ quietly and grabbed his phone, unlocking it with shaking hands.
“I know this thing with the plane of the Centaurs rattled you.”
Shane nodded and pressed his thumbs against the edges of his phone, Ilya’s messages on Instagram open on the screen. By now, Shane had memorized every single word of it. He had also made a screenshot. He hadn’t uploaded it to the cloud because that felt too risky. But he would save it on his laptop as soon as he was back home.
“You really should sit down, JJ,” Shane repeated. “You asked for the truth. And maybe I should’ve … You’re one of my best friends. But I don’t know how you’ll react.”
JJ hadn’t reacted well in the beginning when Shane had come out to the team as gay. No one had reacted well, really, and most of the guys still side-eyed him. It wasn’t as bad as Shane had feared for so many years before Scott Hunter had come out so very publicly, but it was still soul-crushing to see how differently he was treated by some now. Sometimes Shane was sure that the only reason he was still wearing the C was that they didn’t have a publicly acceptable reason to take it away.
“I think I already know, Shane,” JJ said.
Shane frowned. “What?”
“Your crush on Rozanov? It’s … I don’t think anyone else would notice, but I know you.”
Shane swallowed.
“I don’t know the last time I had an unrequited crush, but I remember how much it sucks,” JJ continued.
Before he could say anything else, Shane laughed, sharply and without any humor in it. He turned the phone and held it out for JJ instead of verbally correcting him. He didn’t know if his friend would believe him, but no one could ever read these words from Ilya—words he had intended to be his last if the worst happened—and not believe just how deep his love for Shane was.
JJ lowered his gaze, but he took the phone. Shane tried to watch him as he read the message, but he was on the verge of crying again—as if he somehow hadn’t cried enough yet—and he couldn’t read his friend’s expression at all through the tears blurring his sight.
“Ilya wrote this when he thought…” Shane couldn’t say it, and he had to clear his throat. “That was intended to be his last words. It’s what he wanted me to hear from him if we never got a chance to talk again.”
The silence stretched uncomfortably long. Then JJ exhaled slowly. “How long?”
Shane rolled his head back and stared at the ceiling. Was this better or worse than the shouting he had expected, the anger he feared so much? When Shane had come out to the team as gay, JJ had needed some time to deal with it. JJ reaction back then had hurt, even though it hadn’t been completely unexpected, but he thought they were back to where they had once been as friends. Shane didn’t expect him to be happy about Ilya, but he didn’t know what JJ’s reaction now meant.
“Forever,” Shane murmured, still staring at the ceiling. The pull had been there from the first time they’d met, from the first moment he had seen Ilya on the ice in person, training with his team from Russia, even before Shane had pulled up the courage to introduce himself to Ilya. But that was probably not what JJ meant. “Rookie season.”
“What?” JJ asked incredulously.
Shane shrugged. “It wasn’t always like … I mean … That we were honest with each other about what it is, that we agreed it wasn’t casual? Going on four years.”
“Four years,” JJ said slowly. “For fucks sake. Did Rozanov sign with Ottawa for you?”
Shane swallowed. ‘I already chose you,’ Ilya’s voice echoed through his head, and a new wave of tears threatened to overwhelm Shane. He was still so terrified of what coming out would mean for them, of how people would react, of how hockey might change for them—of how it might even end completely. But he had faced a much more terrifying reality now—one even more terrifying than the fear he had been battling with for weeks about the possibility that Ilya might break up with him.
“I can’t believe this,” JJ muttered. He dropped Shane’s phone on the bed and stood. “I need … I love you, man, but I need some time to process. This is … Can you imagine the scandal once this comes out?”
Shane huffed. “Why do you think we’ve kept this a secret even after Hunter proved being openly gay wouldn’t necessarily end our careers?”
JJ rubbed a hand over his face. “Right. That’s … I need time.”
Shane turned away from his friend, and this time he didn’t force himself to relax his posture. “Don’t tell anyone.”
JJ laughed dryly. “Who’d believe me, really? And I’m not…” For a moment, he grabbed Shane’s shoulder. “Just give me some time. I’m not … I’m still your friend, Shane.”
Shane nodded silently. A moment later, he heard the door close, and he barely made it to the bed before his legs gave out. He still had to finish packing, but right now, he didn’t think he could move. Despite JJ’s reassurance, he wasn’t so sure if he hadn’t just lost a friend.
***
“I’m driving you home.”
Shane turned to JJ and stared at him blankly. The flight home to Montreal had been terrible, but thankfully no one had bothered him during it. Hayden had chosen the seat beside Shane, but he hadn’t forced him into any conversation, had let Shane stare out the window without disturbing him. He had distracted anyone else from trying to draw Shane into conversation—not that many people on the team still tried to include Shane in casual conversation—and he had cursed out several people for joking about the Centaurs’ emergency landing.
“Had to fight Hayden for it,” JJ said frowning, voice rough.
“You don’t have…”
“Yeah, I do,” JJ interrupted him. “You’re in no condition to drive. Did you sleep at all last night?”
Shane shook his head slowly.
JJ nodded and gestured towards his car, so Shane followed him with a sigh. He could point out that he had taken an Uber to the airport rather than drive himself anyway, but he figured that wouldn’t get him out of riding with JJ either.
“So, Hayden knew all along,” JJ said darkly as soon as they were both settled in the car.
“Not all along. He figured it out, though,” Shane said quietly. “Wasn’t really my choice, or Ilya’s choice.”
JJ huffed. “Who else knows?”
Shane ran his tongue over his lips, wondering why that mattered at all. “My parents. Because Dad walked in on us when we were at the cottage one summer. Ryan Price. Because he walked in on us one evening at the summer hockey camps last year.”
JJ laughed, and it sounded much more honest than Shane had expected. “Are you trying to tell me I’m the first you told voluntarily?”
“Not quite,” Shane admitted with a sigh. “We told Farah last summer. Figured she should know as our agent, and that we’d need a new agent if she couldn’t support us.”
“Makes sense,” JJ agreed.
“Ilya’s got a friend in Boston, but I don’t know if she knows my name,” Shane continued. “And … I told Rose years ago. She was … the first person I came out to.”
“Other than Rozanov.”
Shane shook his head. “No. Even before Ilya. I … tried for a very long time to tell myself that I liked women, too. And that I would eventually stop … hooking up with Ilya. That was what the whole thing with Rose was about from the beginning. So, yeah. She is the first person I ever admitted that I’m gay to.”
JJ was silent, and when Shane glanced at him, his hands were gripping the steering wheel tightly. Shane turned his head away and stared out the window, watching the buildings pass by. It was at least another half an hour to his house.
“Rookie season, really?” JJ asked eventually. “How did that even work?”
Shane shrugged. “A stolen hour or two in either of our hotel rooms. Ilya’s number saved in my phone under a woman’s name.” He huffed and dragged his hands through his hair. “I bought a whole ass building with three condos and a business unit on the ground floor, which was the only thing in the building I rented out. So that we had a place to meet where no one would see us together.”
“Wow,” JJ exhaled slowly.
“Eventually, I went to Ilya’s place whenever we were in Boston,” Shane murmured. Somehow, it felt good to talk about all of it, to just unload all of it on someone. He had talked about some of it with his parents, who had looked so crushed about it all. It had felt more like burdening them than letting go of his own burdens. “I didn’t allow him to visit me here at home for … a really long time.”
“Too risky,” JJ said quietly. “I mean, not really riskier than going to his place in Boston, but I can see why you’d have felt that way.”
Shane just shrugged.
JJ sighed deeply. “I don’t know what to say, Shane. I’m … I still think there are better guys you could find. Rozanov is an ass.”
“There aren’t,” Shane said tiredly. “Ilya is … everything.”
Shane had known that for a long time, even when he had still tried to ignore it. Over the past couple of years, he’d wondered over and over again when he had fallen in love with Ilya. He was never able to pinpoint when it had happened exactly; it had just been there at one point, overwhelming and all-consuming.
“Did you ever…” JJ huffed. “How does this work on the ice?”
Shane glared at his friend—he could imagine exactly what JJ had wanted to ask at first. “Neither of us would ever lose on purpose,” he snapped.
JJ exhaled loudly. “Okay.”
“You’ve been playing with me for years,” Shane said angrily. “Did you ever get the impression I wasn’t giving my best out on the ice? That I was slacking off when I was facing Ilya?”
“No,” JJ admitted quietly.
“So, why would you even ask that fucking question?”
“You’re legendary rivals, Shane,” JJ said. “And Rozanov is an asshole. I just don’t understand. I’d like to question if it’s even serious for him, but I can’t get his messages you showed me out of my head. Or your reaction to the emergency landing.”
Shane shrugged.
“I don’t understand,” JJ repeated. “But that doesn’t mean you don’t have my support, Shane. Whatever you need.”
“Thank you.”
“You got a plan, right?” JJ asked. “I mean, it’s you. I can’t see Rozanov having any plan, but I also don’t really know him off the ice. But you have to have a plan. I’m half convinced already, Ottawa for Rozanov was your plan, and I still think it’s insane he’d join that team just for you.”
Shane couldn’t help but chuckle. “Maybe.” Then he blew out a breath. “We had a plan. Ottawa was as much about … not being so far apart as it was about citizenship for Ilya. Other than that?” Shane shrugged. “Keep it all a secret until we both retire in a decade or so. I don’t think I can do that now.”
“Because of the emergency landing?” JJ asked.
Shane bit his lip. “I think … this conclusion has been coming for a long time. We’ve spent the last four summers together. Two weeks at the cottage. Then, for the last two years, the summer hockey camps. The sacrifice of spending so much time apart has become … unbearable. I was just stubborn about admitting that to myself.”
“So, what’s the new plan?” JJ asked.
“I don’t have one yet,” Shane said.
That wasn’t quite true. He knew exactly what he wanted to do, could already picture how he wanted to set up Ilya’s living room the day he’d arrive home. Thankfully, the Voyageurs had a couple of free days without games, and practice the day after the Centaurs were scheduled to land in Ottawa wasn’t mandatory for Shane. So, he could go to Ottawa the night Ilya arrived and spend that following day with him.
JJ threw him a skeptical look. “You, of all people, don’t have a plan?”
“I’ll come up with one,” Shane murmured. “Maybe I’ll even find one where I don’t have to give up hockey.”
“Come on,” JJ said incredulously.
“You’ve seen how the team reacted just to the news I was gay,” Shane snapped. “Some of the guys don’t talk to me at all anymore outside of training and games when they absolutely have to. I didn’t miss Comeau’s birthday party because I chose to. I wasn’t invited, the second year in a row now. In fact, he explicitly told me not to show up the first time around. And he isn’t the only one who has explicitly told me I’m not welcome in his space outside of training and games. Don’t think it’s a coincidence either that I’ve only ever been rooming with you or Hayden when we’re on the road if I’m sharing with anyone.”
JJ let out a string of curses.
“I only told the team and the coaches that I’m gay,” Shane continued quietly. “No one else who didn’t already know before. And suddenly Roger Crowell asked to meet, and I had to listen to him telling me in no uncertain terms that I better not consider coming out openly.”
“What the fuck?” JJ asked loudly.
Shane shrugged.
“You think that was Theriault?”
“Don’t know who else would’ve talked about my sexuality with the commissioner. It doesn’t matter, in the end. I trusted this team, I gave them so much over the decade I have been playing for the Voyageurs, and their homophobia is still more important to them than knowing me. We’ll see what happens when Ilya and I come out. If Crowell doesn’t just outright blacklist both of us with the whole League.”
“He can’t blacklist you for being gay,” JJ said.
“But for dating my rival?”
“I don’t think there are rules about that.” JJ cleared his throat. “It’s working in the women’s league.”
“Less money in the women’s league because our world is fucked up and doesn’t pay them what they deserve,” Shane muttered. “Also, the men who make the decisions about this don’t mind seeing two women together. That’s something they can fantasize about after all, isn’t it? So much less gross and unnatural than two guys together.”
JJ threw him a wide-eyed look.
Shane shrugged. It wasn’t exactly his own thoughts he was voicing there; he’d had some very enlightening conversations with Leah and Max before and after their hockey camps. He really didn’t understand half of their bitter comments about women’s hockey, because he knew too little about the inner workings of their league. But he believed them without a doubt and wasn’t above using the arguments they had provided him.
JJ sighed. “You won’t be thrown out of the NHL. That would be stupid. And your mom would make you sue everyone.”
That made Shane laugh. “Yeah, true.”
“I’ve got your back,” JJ promised softly. “No matter what’s going to happen. I … Hayd and I talked. I know we haven’t been the best friends since you came out to the team. We’ve been too quiet about a lot of the bullshit everyone is throwing at you.”
“You and I are very used to laughing off the bullshit everyone throws at us,” Shane said. “Racism, homophobia. In the end, it’s all the same, just dressed up differently. Don’t throw your career away for me, JJ. We’ve seen this season what just speaking up against the status quo will do to a player in this league.”
“You probably know more about that thing with Barrett than anyone else outside of the Centaurs.”
He really didn’t, Shane thought. Because Ilya was finding a new friend in Troy Barrett, and it had been driving Shane insane with so much jealousy that he had never really listened when Ilya had talked about him. Just another point to show how badly Shane had fucked up.
“It’s ugly,” Shane said darkly. “But it very clearly shows what state the League is in, doesn’t it? And what Ilya and I have to expect when we come out.”
***
Ilya sighed deeply and pressed a kiss against Shane’s shoulder as he woke up. Waking up beside Shane was still such a novel and precious experience, even after the years they had now spent stealing every quiet moment they could. Ilya would never get tired of it.
When Ilya moved to press his whole body against Shane, the chain around his neck shifted, and he couldn’t help the smile when he was reminded of the ring he was wearing beside the cross now. He pressed another kiss against Shane’s shoulder—his fiancé’s shoulder. He had forgotten for a moment about coming home to his living room filled with a million electric candles. If their batteries had held the whole night, they would still be burning downstairs.
“Good morning,” Shane murmured sleepily.
“Very good morning,” Ilya agreed.
He left a trail of more kisses along Shane’s shoulder and rubbed his thumb over one of Shane’s nipples. Ilya felt an intense need to fuck Shane, to be inside his fiancé. He needed to feel this connection, needed to get lost in Shane in a way he could only achieve when he was fucking him.
Shane sighed and shifted, pulling the blanket away from them. He grabbed Ilya’s hair with and pulled it just slightly. Ilya followed the direction and pressed a kiss against Shane’s mouth as he rolled on top of him. Shane spread his legs, and Ilya settled comfortably between them.
“No condom,” Shane murmured. “Want to feel all of you.”
“Yes,” Ilya agreed readily.
Shane pulled on his hair again, and Ilya pressed his whole body against Shane as he kissed him deeply. For a little while, that was all they did, just basking in the feeling of being in this moment with each other.
Eventually, Ilya reached out blindly for the lube on the nightstand. Shane gave a soft whine when Ilya pulled back to kneel between his legs, and frowned up at Ilya with an adorable pout, but he also pulled his knees up, spreading his legs more to give Ilya better access.
Ilya grinned and winked at Shane. “Don’t pout,” he murmured in Russian. He leaned forward and kissed Shane’s knee, then trailed kisses down the inside of Shane’s thigh. Shane hissed, and by the time Ilya’s lips reached Shane’s cock it was already hard and leaking.
Ilya looked up through his lashes, and at the same moment he took Shane’s cock in his mouth he pushed a finger inside his fiancé. Shane groaned and grabbed Ilya’s hair again as his hips bucked up.
“Fuck, Ilya.” Shane groaned. “Hurry up.”
Ilya chuckled, which made Shane pull on his hair painfully, and added a second finger. It was so easy to open Shane up now, he was always so relaxed and trusted Ilya with practically everything. He also was always happy to let Ilya play with his ass however he wanted, and on another day, Ilya might have ignored Shane’s demands to spend some more time doing just that.
But not this morning. Because there was really only one thing Ilya wanted at the moment, and clearly it was exactly the same thing Shane wanted.
Shane threw his head back into the pillow with a groan when Ilya sucked hard one last time on his cock. Then he pulled back, lined his own cock up with Shane’s hole, and sank in.
“Yes,” Ilya hissed.
He pressed his forehead against Shane’s and just stayed like that for a moment, savoring the intense feeling of connection. If it were up to Ilya, he would spend an eternity just like this, not moving at all, just feeling Shane everywhere. Shane sighed and kissed him, then he curled one leg around Ilya’s waist and reached for his hand, lacing their fingers together.
“Hey,” Shane murmured breathlessly.
“I love you,” Ilya whispered. He rocked his hips forward in long, slow movements, savoring every moment of pleasure.
“I love you, too,” Shane answered in Russian, and there were moments like this when hearing Shane speak his native language took all of Ilya’s breath away.
Ilya kissed Shane, and they got lost in the slow pleasure of the morning. It felt like coming home after a too long journey, and Ilya tried to burn every second of this moment into his memories. He’d nearly lost his chance of being like this with Shane because of a fucking plane, and before that, he had nearly ruined it all by himself. He needed to do better holding onto Shane.
Ilya had lost all sense of time, all sense of anything besides Shane, when Shane shuddered beneath him and came with a gasp. Ilya followed him just a moment later.
“Stay,” Shane murmured, pulling at Ilya and arching his body up against him. Ilya dropped on top of his fiancé, neither of them caring for the mess between them or Ilya’s slowly softening cock still buried in Shane.
***
After taking a shower together—one which didn’t lead to any saved water at all because the temptation of a wet and naked Shane was just too great—they eventually sat down together in the kitchen for breakfast. Shane had his usual protein shake, and for once Ilya chose not to tease him about it while he enjoyed his eggs and sausages. Ilya honestly thought Shane didn’t need the diet he had been subjugating himself to for nearly a year now to improve his performance, but bringing that up always led to arguments.
They ate in silence while sitting on barstools at the island that separated Ilya’s kitchen from the living room. This was another rare treat Ilya had learned to really enjoy in the past four years. In the beginning, during that first year after Ilya had gone to the cottage, when spending any time with each other had still been a little more difficult than now since he had still been in Boston, just enjoying a quiet moment like this had often felt like wasted time. Now, Ilya was convinced one of his favorite things was to just co-exist with Shane in the same room, even if they were both lost in thought or doing their own thing.
It was Shane who broke the silence. “I’m sorry.”
Ilya frowned. “What for?”
“Everything?” Shane shrugged and turned his chair so that he faced Ilya.
His shake was already long gone, and Ilya wondered for a moment if he had waited to speak up until Ilya had finished eating. Ilya put his fork down slowly and ran his tongue over his lips. “I don’t understand.”
“I know I’ve been … I haven’t paid enough attention to the way you struggle,” Shane said slowly. “And I think maybe we’ve both been … avoiding some topics because we knew it would most likely lead to a fight. And we didn’t want to waste the little time we have together with that, right?”
Ilya shrugged. It was true. He had even said as much to Galina, who had questioned that perception of things.
“I’ve been thinking about this since our phone call after Christmas.” Shane swallowed visibly. “The first one after our fight. When you said it had cost us a whole day and night. We’ve both been bottling up all these things. And I hate that. I hated driving back to Montreal that day. I wish I could’ve gone to brood at my parents’ place for a couple of hours and then come home to you. I wish we could’ve at least slept in the same bed that night, even if we maybe didn’t resolve the fight right away.”
Ilya cleared his throat and nodded. He hadn’t even thought about that as a possibility, but now he was filled with an insane longing for that kind of solution. “Maybe we work on that.”
Shane smiled shyly. “Yeah. I think we may have a lot to work on. I … I thought for a while, after that fight, that you might break up with me.”
“What? Never!” Iyla stood and cradled Shane’s face in his hands. He didn’t have the right words in English, not in this moment, so he said in Russian, “You’re my life, Shane. There is no reality where I can see my life without you.”
Shane smiled at him with tears in his eyes. “It is for me same,” he answered in Russian, the words a little broken and jumbled. He sighed and switched back to English. “I feel so selfish. And I’m so sorry for that. You should come out to whomever you want to come out to. I am so sorry that I let my fear push you into this cage.”
“Is okay.” Ilya sighed and leaned their foreheads together.
“It’s not okay,” Shane murmured. He grabbed Ilya’s hips and pulled him between his legs until he could wrap his arms around Ilya’s waist, holding on a little too tightly to be comfortable. “I … I think I should find a therapist, too. Because I don’t think the way I’m afraid of coming out … the way that thought makes everything inside me freeze … is normal. Something there is broken. I am broken.”
Ilya pulled his head back to look at Shane, who lowered his gaze immediately. “Yeah, okay. Whatever you need. But you aren’t broken, sweetheart.”
It was the first time Shane had described how the thought of coming out made him feel. Usually, he had a whole list of arguments about everything that would change for them—mostly their careers ending—when he insisted they couldn’t come out yet, not even to one or two people either of them trusted. Ilya hadn’t even suspected that there was more hidden beneath those arguments, especially not something that was so clearly so painful for Shane.
Shane huffed with a mirthless chuckle and shook his head. “I think I am a little bit broken. Because I know I want us to come out. I never again want either of us to be in a situation where one of us has to wonder if they’ll get the important information about the other. If something had happened to you, the hospital wouldn’t have told me anything!”
“Not true,” Ilya murmured. “David is my emergency contact. Together with Wiebe. He’d have told them to tell you everything.”
Shane stared at him wide-eyed. “I didn’t know.”
Ilya shrugged. “Another upsetting topic, right? But would be easy to explain because of foundation and I don’t have family on this continent. Not family people would recognize as it, at least.”
“Yeah. Wow.” Shane sighed. “I’m glad, though. But still. I meant every word yesterday when I told you that we should come out this summer. And I want that. But I’m still … so fucking afraid of just that thought alone. Sometimes it makes me so afraid I can’t even breathe. I don’t even know why.”
“It’s scary,” Ilya said. “I know it’s scary. And you don’t have a plan. You like plans. They help you.”
Shane nodded.
“So we make new plan,” Ilya said. “And first step in plan is to find therapist for you.”
“How did you find yours?”
Ilya made a face. “There is only one therapist in all of Ottawa who speaks Russian. Just luck I don’t hate her, I think. But we can look at names online for therapists in Montreal.”
“Or maybe here in Ottawa,” Shane murmured and averted his gaze.
Ilya frowned. Ottawa wasn’t that far away from Montreal, but it would still make it more difficult for Shane to attend his appointments. But he saw the kind of tension settle in Shane’s whole posture that had been slowly growing over the past two years or so whenever they talked about his team.
So, Ilya just nodded. “Okay.”
“Who would you want to come out to?” Shane asked. “Maybe … maybe your whole team all at once is not the best choice.”
Ilya flexed his jaw. “You say that because of your team.”
Shane shrugged. “There is no reason for you to make the same mistake I did.”
Ilya didn’t think there was a single person on his team who would have a problem if he came out to them. None of them had a problem with Harris, who was much closer to the team than the Bears’ social media manager had been to his team in Boston.
“Wyatt,” Ilya said instead of arguing for his team. “His sister has wife. He will be fine.” He could deal with baby steps if it made Shane less anxious. “And Bood. Barett knows I am bisexual, but would be nice to tell him about you.”
Shane bit his lip, then he nodded with a wobbly smile. “Yeah, okay. Sounds good.”
“And if I want to tell them about you, too?”
Shane inhaled sharply and pressed his eyes shut. “I … I don’t know.”
“Okay.”
“Wyatt will be at the All-Star weekend, too, right?” Shane whispered.
“Yes,” Ilya said, confused.
“Maybe we can talk to him together then,” Shane murmured. “And maybe … We need to make a new plan. And I don’t know where to start because I don’t know what to expect.”
Ilya groaned and melodramatically dropped his head against Shane’s shoulder before looking back up at him. “You want to talk to dinosaur Hunter?”
Shane chuckled. “I mean, yeah? Who else could tell us what we have to expect from coming out? Ryan couldn’t tell us anything when we asked because he cut all connection to the NHL just when he came out. And doesn’t spend any time online.”
“That means coming out to Hunter,” Ilya said with raised brows.
“Pretty sure he is safe to come out to, considering.”
Ilya nodded. Hunter would be safe, of course. But the comment also gave him another hint of some of the things going on in Shane’s life that they hadn’t talked about. They would have time to talk about it later, Ilya decided. They didn’t have time to talk about everything right at this moment. Even if what they had to talk about was how safe Shane felt with his own team. Or rather, how unsafe.
“I told JJ about you,” Shane said, interrupting Ilya’s thoughts. “I was completely out of it when I heard about the emergency landing. He noticed. I think he was the only one, though. I hope he was the only one. Anyway, he asked me about it. Because he thought I had an unrequited crush on you.”
Ilya laughed. “What? Really?”
Shane rolled his eyes.
Ilya grinned smugly. “Your crush is very requited.”
“That’s what I told him.” Shane blushed deeply. “More or less. He wasn’t very happy about it at first. But he promised he’d be there for me. I hope he’ll come around fully once he gets to know you off the ice.”
“We should invite him to dinner with the Pikes,” Ilya suggested. “Jackie will be on my side.”
Shane blinked, clearly confused for a moment, then he rolled his eyes. “She will! Maybe that’s a good idea.”
“All my ideas are good.”
“Some of your ideas are good.”
Ilya huffed and glared at Shane.
Shane grinned. “We’re going to figure this out.”
“Yes, of course.” Ilya cupped one of his cheeks with his hand again as he kissed him. “We will learn to talk about the bad things, too. And to fight without wasting time.”
“And maybe you can speak Russian to me a little more,” Shane suggested. “I want to be able to always understand you. I feel I haven’t been learning fast enough.”
Ilya frowned. “You learned a lot. Russian is difficult language.”
“I’ve got a lot of the basics. Maybe it will be easier to learn now by using it more. Speaking it more frequently. I know it won’t be the same for you as speaking Russian with Svetlana or other Russians.”
“It will be great,” Ilya promised, in Russian, and hoped it was enough to wipe away whatever doubt Shane had about it.
He enjoyed every moment he could speak even just a little bit of Russian with Shane, and he would happily do it more if Shane wanted to. Ilya had never expected that Shane would learn Russian, and watching him learn over the past years had been an utter delight. He still expected that their default language would remain English, despite those moments when English was too difficult for Ilya. He felt a little overwhelmed now by Shane’s clear intent to get to a point where Ilya could just slip into Russian, knowing that Shane would be able to follow whatever he said.