Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The Stanley Cup finals.

Shane has been here twice, and he has won twice. His track record is fantastic, because of course it is. He is one of the best players the league has; part of one of the most successful teams.

Or, was.

This year instead of sitting amongst a sea of montreal-blue, Shane is being swallowed by a pit of centaurs-red.

Hayden is not pressed up against his side, frantically texting his final words to Jackie like a dying man. J.J. is not muttering to himself in French. Mitty is not stretched out on the floor, taking up half the space to stretch his hips. Comeau is not peacocking around the room, yelling and howling and barking like some rabid, wild animal.

It should feel wrong. Except somehow it doesn’t.

Shane misses Hayden like a lost limb, how could he not, but the rest… the rest is fine. Ilya is at his side. Haas is muttering to himself in German. Hayes is stretching. Bood is patting Chouinard on the back, laughing boisterously as they scuffle.

The whole team has been feeling the pressure for weeks, but right now none of them are worried. This is the furthest they have ever gotten in the playoffs. The fucking finals. No matter the result, every single one of them will go home happy.

Shane has always been an all-or-nothing kind of person, though. He knows he will only be truly happy with one result.

That’s why his knee jerks up and down, shaking relentlessly. That’s why his hands claw into his thighs. That’s why his breathing is being tightly controlled. In for four, hold for four, out for four.

The game is set to begin soon and the torturous wait will finally end.

Ilya clears his throat, and every eye in the locker room snaps to him. To their captain. The speech is short and sweet. Music to Shane’s ears as his voice rises in volume, passion and aggression leaking out bit by bit as the seconds tick down.

His last words feel like a declaration of war.

Ilya is grinning, voice booming from the walls. Then they’re moving, a sea of black and red crashing down the hallway towards the crowd. Shane walks at the back like he always does, making sure every single skate is safely on the ice before his.

Far in front of him Ilya is leading the charge, shoulders set, chin up, ready. It makes Shane feel ready too. Last night he had knelt under the shadow of those shoulders in such holy silence, it hadn’t felt real when he’d been pulled back up and coaxed into speaking again.

There is nothing silent about the room now. Fans screaming their throats dry, announcements booming over the mics, players clattering about the bench.

Shane finds his spot on the ice without needing to think about it. His skates know exactly where to go: stick down, eyes front, he waits at the centre of the rink.

Scott Hunter floats up in front of him. If he’s surprised to see Shane on the starting line instead of Ilya, he doesn’t show it. He lowers himself, straightens his stance, flexes his hands around his stick.

“No chirp?” He asks.

Shane moves his gaze down to the ice, to the exact point he thinks the puck will land. That’s where he will take it, where he will swipe his stick and steal it from Scott.

“I don’t need chirps to win.” Shane says.

In for four, hold for four, out for four. He’d practiced those breaths last night too, with Ilya’s hand on his chest. Pressing, relaxing, pressing, relaxing. He can feel the weight of the touch on him now, ghosting all over his body.

“Neither do I.”

The puck drops.

Shane wins.

-

Everything after the buzzer was a blur. Shane can barely remember having his hands on the cup, but later he will open his phone and see a picture of him hoisting it above his head, a mindless grin on his sweaty face.

There had been hugs and cheers and pats on the back, too. The families who had made the trip to the game had flooded the ice. Not as many as a home win, but they will do that next year.

The celebration had followed them back into the locker room, of course. There was champagne to pop and an entire night of partying to be planned in the next thirty minutes.

Ilya meets him halfway across the room, striding over with a single-minded purpose. It is the most reminiscent of Domspace Ilya has ever looked outside of their bedroom. So tense and focussed. So utterly elated. So like he could conquer the world.

They’d conquered the hockey world, at least.

“Fuck!” Shane knows he is grinning like a maniac, because why wouldn’t he be? “Fuck you! Fucking hell! We fucking won!”

Ilya’s arms swing around his middle, hoisting him half a foot into the air and spinning them around. It feels like half the team piles on, some of them throwing themselves around Shane from behind, some of them around Ilya.

The world blurs again, and Shane locks his ankles around Ilya’s waist. Ilya leans in close, smelling like sweat and pride and the anxious cigarette he’d had before the game.

When he kisses Shane, it’s not that it’s unexpected. It’s just— there had been a plan. A carefully-crafted speech. A list of confident reassurances prepared for the team members who might resist the idea of a couple playing together.

In this moment, Shane can’t remember a single thing they’d decided. He can’t remember anything at all. Maybe he doesn’t even know his own name anymore.

All he knows is they won, and he won, and Ilya won, and they did it together.

Ilya pulls away from the kiss quickly, too quickly. His grin is utterly infectious.

“A beautiful fucking goal from my beautiful fucking Sub!”

Oh yeah. Shane knows that, too. He knows he scored the winning goal with a textbook perfect backhand shot that he will use as his retort to Ilya’s teasing every day for the rest of their lives.

“Fuck yes, Holl-and-er! Holl-and-er! Holl-and-er!”

Shane is pretty sure it’s Hayes who starts the chant from where he is squished between Chouinard and Dykstra. It echoes through the room and sinks into his bones and fuck it— he kisses Ilya again, and this time he doesn’t pull away.

-

“Hey Mom.” Shane sighs, lurching forwards onto the sofa, muscles aching and exhausted after using the home-gym, “You know you don’t have to keep calling. I know you’re happy I won.”

A beat. All there is is silence. Static, but not quite. Shane can feel his frown as he takes the phone away from his face to check the call is still connected. Maybe it had been a misdial?

“Mom? Is the line dead?”

Ilya enters the living room, his own face shiny with a thin layer of sweat, golden curls stuck to the sides of his face.

“Shane.”

She doesn’t say it, not aloud, but the tone is enough. Shane knows that tone. He has relived the memory of sitting in that hospital bed after Billy Benson a thousand times. The sadness. The shock. The grief.

“Shane I’m so sorry—“

His first instinct is to hang up on her. Hearing her say it would make it too real. So instead he stares down at the blank screen for a second. Then two. Then his fingers are moving faster than the speed of light, opening Google and typing in his name.

He knows before he sees it. He just knows. Seeing it is just a torturous confirmation, putting him out of his misery. It’s splashed on every news website and gossip page there is. It’s even trending on Twitter.

For the past few days, their cup win had been trending in all the usual hockey spaces. It’s a good story— everyone likes an underdog.

Today, however, his name is trending just about everywhere. Not his team. Not their win. Him.

The clip auto-starts on Twitter.

“And how do you feel about the Centaurs? They are the new big threat, it seems, winning the cup with Rozanov as Captain and Hollander newly minted as Alternate after just a few short months with them.”

“Oh. We’re happy for Hollander, definitely. It’s such a groundbreaking thing to do, isn’t it, a Sub playing hockey?”

The player is wearing a Montreal jersey, but it’s not Drapeau. It’s not Comeau. It’s not even fucking Mitty. Shane barely even remembers his face. That makes it worse: how malicious it feels. He had no skin in the game. And yet— yet there he is sat across from an interviewer, smirking like the cat who got the fucking cream.

He pretends it’s a slip of the tongue, makes a show of gasping and apologising, but the smirk never fades.

Shane feels the phone slide out of his hand. Maybe it hits the floor, maybe it doesn’t.

The room disappears around him. For one single lurching moment, Shane is nowhere. He is surrounded by nothingness. Even the chewing feeling of dread cannot follow him here. Just the sound of that clip repeating over and over again, skipping back to that last line like a broken record player.

A sub playing hockey.

A sub.

Sub.

Shane is, and always has been, a fucking—

Shane gasps. He gulps in air greedily, taking and taking, barely leaving enough time to exhale between breaths.

There are hands on him, two solid anchors dragging him back from wherever that had been. Whatever twisted, terrible place his mind had taken him.

In some ways, it felt like Subspace. His headspace is empty. Dark. A kind of calm that is rare in his crazy life.

The quiet of this new place was not calming. It had felt vast and echoing, like an empty chasm stretching out around him. Cold, even, if the goosebumps wracking up and down his arms had anything to say about it.

“Shane.”

Ilya’s voice filters through slower than his touch.

“Shane, I need you to tell me what to do.”

Of course Ilya expects him to know what to do. Shane is a chronic planner. He overthinks every small detail. He writes lists of lists he needs to write. There’s always a statement ready on his phone, a PR-approved answer balanced on the tip of his tongue.

But not for this.

Shane doesn’t know, and his career is over and his head is swimming and Ilya is probably really fucking disappointed in him for not having a backup plan.

He’s hopeless. A failure. Winning the cup is a curse. Every year he pushes his body as far as it will go, and then he wins, and then he also, inevitably loses. What’s the fucking point?

-

“Shane, I need you to look at me.” Hazel eyes.

“Are you here?” No.

“Shane, I need you to speak.” No.

“Shane. Speak.” His muscles burn. Why do they burn?

“Please.” His jaw is creaking. He wants it to stop.

“No, no, please don’t cry. Shh. Is going to be okay. You have to be okay—“

-

Returning to reality from a drop feels a little like coming out of a deep sleep. His eyes feel glued shut, and his muscles feel heavy, and everything around him is warm.

It’s not a bad feeling, really. Not until he opens his eyes, at least. Opening his eyes is like releasing the floodgates: the entire world comes crashing down around him for the second time that day.

A sub playing hockey.

Even the thought, the mere memory of the words, threatens to yank him back underwater. His head rings with it, heartbeat pulsing behind his eyes rather than in his chest where it should be.

Perhaps that’s how he feels— like someone had turned him upside-down and shaken him around, dislodging everything from its rightful place.

“Ilya.”

That particular desire, at least, is still in its usual place. A deep-seated and aching need for his Dom when he is scared. A need to be close. A confidence that nothing bad will happen to him if Ilya is there.

“Shane?”

There’s a crack in Ilya’s voice. Something different than usual, high-pitched and maybe just as terrified as Shane had felt when he’d clicked on that video.

Despite the awful pain bursting behind his eyes Shane opens them again, suddenly more desperate to lay eyes on Ilya than he is to avoid the world.

He wants to touch Ilya. He wants to be so close that he can crawl into his skin and make a home there, a place where the news and the gossip can’t find him.

Shane can’t remember when they had moved into the bedroom. He is lying back on the bed and Ilya is perched on the edge, hovering over him. His hair is all mussed up, and his eyes are red-rimmed.

Ilya had cried? Had Shane cried? Was it Shane’s fault Ilya was crying?

“Ilya—“ Shane feels his desperation grow tenfold. He springs up from the bed so fast he nearly smacks their foreheads together. Not that a concussion could make this situation any worse. Not knowing what was happening might even make it better.

The whole world knows he is a Sub. What the fuck.

“Shh… yes. Is okay. Is okay.” Ilya repeats the words over and over in a quiet, mumbled mantra. His breath tickles against Shane’s scalp, accent thick. It always gets thick like that when he’s tired, when he’s worried, when he’s both.

While Ilya holds him, feeling slowly trickles back into Shane’s body, aches wracking up and down his limbs. Sharp, bone-melting aches, the kind he gets after a particularly gruelling practice with bag skates until he puked.

“My body hurts.” He says, because his brain-to-mouth filter is apparently not a priority for his body in survival mode, and it’s one of the very last things to return.

Ilya doesn’t seem to mind. He turns his head, the line of his jaw bumping against the top of Shane’s head, “Orders.” He says, “You did not… respond. I was very scared. I am sorry, moya lyubov.”

“Oh.”

There is nothing else to say. Shane hadn’t been in control. He definitely hadn’t been the one choosing to drop. His body took over to protect itself. Everything had just threatened to be too overwhelming, too sharply terrifying.

Of course he knows he is safe with Ilya. But driven only by instinct, his body had clearly felt otherwise.

How much had Ilya had to push to get him here, lying back in bed? How many orders had wracked through his body, pressing down on his lungs, tearing at his limbs?

In every aching muscle, Shane isn’t just feeling his own pain. He is feeling Ilya’s desperation. His panic. His dominance, clawing Shane back to the surface tiny piece by tiny piece.

Shane hadn’t been shaking when he woke up, but he certainly is now. They are full body trembles that chatter his teeth.

Ilya wastes no time in squeezing him tightly, in surrounding him as completely as he can, as if he can press the panic out from between them.

“How about warm bath?” He suggests, cheek still pressed into Shane’s hair, “We have essential oil.”

Nothing has ever sounded better. Shane nods, the movement awkwardly jerky and unstable, “Yeah. Yes. Mhm. Okay. Thank you.”

There’s a kiss on his hair, then his forehead, a trail of Ilya’s lips as he stands, savouring every last second of their closeness. His left hand is the last thing to leave, slipping up Shane’s forearm, along the crook of his elbow, up his bicep, ghosting over his cheek and— 

“Ilya?”

A near-silent hum. The burn of two steady hazel eyes into Shane’s.

“Thank you.”

That earns him one last kiss. It searches, slow and intent, like he is learning the shape of Shane’s lips all over again— hesitant pressure giving way to an edge of desperation.

And then he is gone, moving up and away and leaving Shane there, staring after him, wondering how the hell they are going to deal with this.

The bath is quick to run and his brain is more disorganised than Ilya’s locker, so he doesn’t get very far. The hot water fogs up the bathroom mirror and steam fills the room. By the time the whole house is smelling sweetly of lavender, Shane’s body is aching twice as bad, a silent plea for him to get in and relax.

Ilya steadies him with hands on his sides, urging him down into the water and then back against the wall of the bath. The help is unnecessary, but certainly not unwelcome.

Well. While it is not physically necessary, it is in other ways. Emotionally, definitely. The thing about drops is that they do not just disappear. They linger. Fester. Bury themselves deep into every crack. Shane’s legs might be steady, but his heart is still hurting. Tears gather. There’s a foreign, dizzying ache behind his eyes.

Holding Ilya’s hand makes everything ease, just slightly. Their fingers slot together neatly, hanging down by the side of the tub.

“It’s perfect.”

Ilya exhales like he had been waiting for the confirmation. Like a bath that wasn’t just right would have been the straw that broke the camel’s back.

“Good.”

A beat, a moment of hesitation that so unlike Ilya that Shane has to squeeze their hands again to remind himself this is still real. Though waking up from a dream right now wouldn’t be too bad, all things considered.

“Your phone has been ringing lots. I have not answered anything.”

Shane sighs, then offers a shrug. He is far too tired for words, and the steam is settling him almost too well. It is calling him towards a real sleep, a perfect eight hours of lingering lavender and soft touches. Is that so much to ask for?

“Later?” He manages, even as his eyes slip closed.

“Is up to you.”

“I don’t want it to be. This fucking sucks.” Which is the understatement of the century, obviously.

Another stretching silence passes them by. Shane does not want to open his eyes. Perhaps if he never opens them again they can stay here forever, suspended in the memory.

“The only good part is this.” Shane finds himself filling the silence, fumbling over words too simple for his messy, complicated thoughts, “You. But it’s awful, too. You shouldn’t have to deal with this. With me, being such a mess—“

Ilya doesn’t let him finish. His tone is razor sharp. Not quite like an insult thrown on the ice— a snap of teeth fit for a feral dog— but they are undeniably firm. “You are mine. Is my job.”

Shane’s eyes fly open. You are mine. His body, of course, is wired to like the feeling of possession. But rest of him fights it, mind far too messy and busy to give in so easily. His already exhausted muscles tense, all bunched up and knotted.

“But it’s a lot.” He argues. That is fact. They can deny it all they like, but that doesn’t make it any less true.

Ilya’s face is irritatingly blank. He is not frowning or scowling or even smiling. He is just… watching.

Eventually he says, “If it was other way around, would you help me?”

“Yes.” Shane exhales, squeezing his eyes closed. The chance of sleep is long gone now. Everything is just so fucking messy now. What did he do in a past life to deserve this? “Fuck. I don’t know, Ilya, that’s a stupid question. We’re different people. I’d be just as anxious and probably still falling apart. All I’m saying is we deserved five fucking seconds to enjoy ourselves.”

That, Ilya has no argument for. His laugh is humourless, void of any joy or rumbling warmth it usually comes with. But it is a laugh. A laugh and a teasing tip of his head as he admits, “Yes, that is probably true.”

-

“I need to call my Mom back.”

Shane still feels… distant. His words feel slow and stilted, sapping all the energy out of him in order to push them from his throat.

“I need to call my agent. Farah. And Coach. Everyone is going to be making statements. I don’t— I don’t want the league to get to paint the narrative. I want everyone to know the truth. How shit it’s been.”

Ilya sets a bowl down in front of him and nods along.

Ice cream stares back at Shane from the bottom of the dish. Vanilla. Chocolate sprinkles. Caramel syrup. Shane’s nutritionist would curl himself up into a ball and cry himself to sleep. The ice cream isn’t even that kind made with coconut milk he treats himself to occasionally. No, this ice cream had Ben and Jerries written on the container, alongside cartoon pictures of cows and clouds.

It feels risky. Wild. Out of character. Different. Everything is going to be different now, isn’t it?

“I’m sorry.” He mumbles, pulling his knees up onto the chair with him, tucking them into his chest. They are a welcome pressure.

Ilya only frowns at him again. He hasn’t smiled all day. Their lazy morning and teasing competition on the exercise bikes feels so far away. How could that have possibly been just this morning?

Shane doesn’t give Ilya time to speak. He doesn’t want to be interrupted. “You should be getting to celebrate our win. Domming someone. Partying. Not…”

Not this. Not tears and drops and ice cream. This feels more like a breakup than a party.

A breakup.

Once he has had the thought, it lodges in his gut, a sharp piece of shrapnel from the bomb that had just exploded his life. Is this too much for Ilya? Will this be their breaking point?

A hand snakes over the tabletop, squeezing Shane’s with a confidence he feels jealous of.

“I am here.” Ilya says. Here. As if he is not the Dom. As if for once Shane is leading the charge, and he is just following. Had he asked Shane for that reassurance during his drop? Had Shane been good and answered, or is the question still lingering in the air? Is Ilya sat here having these same doubts, wondering if this is where everything comes crashing down around them?

“I am with my Sub. I am exactly where I want to be.”

Shane has to ignore the way his heart stutters. He didn’t know it ten seconds ago, but now he does: he cannot leave this table without being certain. He cannot breathe until he knows if this is it. If they are going to be together. What are the words? For better or worse. In sickness and in health. For richer or poorer.

“People will talk. Now that they know, if we get spotted—“

“Let them talk. We won the cup. Who cares? We won, Shane.”

Safe to say Ilya is not going anywhere any time soon.

-

In the end, he doesn’t outright say anything.

The league publishes a statement that asks for player privacy and not-so-subtly covers their own backs, pretending they had been managing his designation and taking care of him since day one. Only a select few people know that this is not the truth, but Shane doesn’t bother to correct anyone. It works in his favour, their begrudging support.

Nothing with the Centaurs changes. Harris sends a text the length of a Jane Austin novel with options for the team’s statement, and it takes Shane an embarrassingly long time to realise he’s asking for Shane’s opinion. Like his voice matters.

Ilya manages to wait half a day before posting a set of pictures to his Instagram, pictures that blur the lines between are-they and aren’t-they. Breakfast in bed. Swimming in the lake. Laughing in the kitchen. All recent, all from the few brief weekends they’d managed to spend in the cottage. The cottage, where it feels like they can most easily be themselves.

Rumors get spread of course, and the internet goes crazy because of course, and nothing will ever stop it when it wants to explode, because of course.

It’s not easy. But they manage.

-

“Shane.” Ilya groans, walking in from the bathroom. With him comes a cloud of soap and shampoo and aftershave, smells lingering in the air with the escaping steam. He doesn’t need to ask what Shane is doing on his phone. He has seen it enough, the little frown Shane knows is etched onto his face whenever he opens social media these days.

“I tell you not to watch these things.” He mutters, flopping down next to him, damp and leaving little droplets of water on the sheets. Shane should tell him to move, to dry off properly instead of the half-assed way he usually does, patting absently at his limbs and then getting bored.

He doesn’t. He should, he knows Ilya is waiting for the reprimand, but he doesn’t. Other thoughts are wizzing around, driving circles around his brain faster than Ilya drives his ridiculous sports cars.

So Shane doesn't look up. He scrolls by another tweet, humming absently.

Ilya’s hand claps around his thigh. His other hand plucks the phone out of his grasp, tossing it behind him.

Shane groans, head falling back against the headboard with a quiet thump, “I can’t help it.”

Ilya’s answering hum is soft, but the way he mouths at Shane’s skin, teeth and all, is not. The way he grips at Shane’s leg, nails digging into the muscle, is certainly not.

“What do I need to do.” His breath is burning against Shane’s neck, “To take you out of your head.”

It’s not a question. Not really. Even if it was, Shane would not have an answer. It’s been a week, and still his phone sometimes gets so many notifications. So many mentions and likes and follows and unfollows— it feels like he needs to keep up with it. It feels like he needs to know. If he knows what people are saying, he has control of what he says back. Of how he acts. Of what he will say when the season starts again and he will have to take post-game interviews where his designation will be on full blast.

“Shane.” Ilya sounds exasperated. Tired and heavy now rather than teasing.

Shane understands. It’s late. They’re both exhausted from dealing with this. He tilts his head, reaching sideways to kiss the corner of Ilya’s mouth.

“I want—“ He shifts, lifting his hands from the sheets and taking Ilya’s shoulders, “I need… quiet.”

“Okay.”

Ilya’s hands make quick work of moving him away, shuffling down the bed and then padding across the room.

The view is good, of course, a treat in and of itself. Ilya has never once been ashamed off his body, and certainly not of showing it off to Shane. Shane is not necessarily ashamed either, but there’s always a little burn of shyness when he is asked to strip, to stand there and let Ilya watch.

Ilya flicks the lights down low, leaving only the bedside lamp left on. He closes the door. He closes the curtains, too, shuttering out any last inkling of the outside world.

Then his attention is turned back to Shane. Single-minded. Intense, but not in the busy way he looks sometimes when he’s thinking of all the possibilities, all the ways he can have Shane. No. This is… well, it’s quiet. He is slow as he moves. His eyes laze over Shane, slow and unhurried as he takes in his own view.

Shane realises, abruptly, that Ilya is in his headspace already. They haven’t played much lately, he knows. Not since his drop. Not for any reason, really. Shane isn’t afraid. Ilya doesn’t seem tentative about it. They’ve just been busy.

This might be the first time ever that Shane has seen Ilya a little deprived. Apparently, he becomes like he’s resting on a hair-trigger. He slips quickly and without fanfare. His limbs get heavy from the hit of it, rather than tense and poised and in-control like usual. His teasing dissipates.

He climbs back into bed one knee after the other, shuffling back against the pillows and reclining, leaning his head back against his arms.

Shane watches, intent, confused. Ilya is obviously waiting for something. Should he… be doing something? He shifts, moving up onto his knees, swinging a leg over Ilya’s, settling down there, watching Ilya watch him.

“Where do you want me?” He hears himself ask. The words are swaddled in the fuzzy, warm feeling in his head, not quite sounding like his own voice.

Ilya lifts a hand, resting it over his hip and then further south, wrapping it around the base of his cock.

Shane shuffles back, watching as it hardens quickly. He can still feel Ilya’s gaze burning on him.

“On your stomach. Get comfortable.”

The words are not an order, not anything his biology forces him to follow. But they are something his Dom is asking of him. Shane thinks sometimes that he would never need an order again, really. Not with how perfectly Ilya takes him down, pushing in all the right ways, saying all the right things.

On his stomach, Shane settles between Ilya’s legs, his chin bumping the top of his thigh.

Ilya’s other hand curls around his cheek, thumb drawing invisible circles into his skin. It feels like he is brushing away phantom tears. Shane ran out days ago, even if the anxiety still swallows him whole sometimes.

“Just lie with me. Keep me warm. That’s all I need.”

Keep me warm.

The head of Ilya’s cock is pressed to his lips. They part automatically. Shane’s eyes flutter closed as the length slides into his mouth. He shuffles forwards, higher, taking Ilya as far as he can. When it hits the back of his throat he stops, letting his chin drop.

The weight is comfortable against his tongue. Familiar, of course. He has had Ilya’s dick in his mouth a hundred times, maybe even a thousand by now.

But never like this. There is no orgasm to be chased. No buzz of thoughts deciding whether to lick or kiss or suck.

Just Shane and the comfort of being touched, everywhere.

Ilya’s head is thrown back, resting against the headboard. One of his hands is curled around Shane’s cheek still. The other rests against his shoulder, lax. Even his legs are curled around Shane, propping him up. Everywhere means everywhere. There’s not an inch of separation between them.

Shane cannot speak, and Ilya clearly does not want to either.

So they sit in silence. In a bubble of leftover steam and dim lamplight and foggy headspace. It is… perfect. Maybe even addictive, because Shane never wants to move. Thinks he might beg for this over and over and over again every day for the rest of his life.

There is no other feeling like it in the world. A spacey, empty silence.

Quiet.

-

“You are okay?”

Shane hums from where he is perched on the edge of the bed, meticulously stretching out the muscles of his shoulders and working his aching jaw.

Ilya is sprawled around him from behind, all but plastered to his back. For the last few minutes he has been pressing featherlight kisses along Shane’s shoulders and down the back of his neck. He has found his way back from his headspace, that much is clear, but he is dragging out their play as much as he can, savouring the gentleness that comes after.

Shane reaches back, leaning into the feeling of Ilya’s hands. They feel heavy against his skin, and his words feel even heavier against the remnants of Subspace still thrumming in his skull.

“Yeah.” Shane finds his tongue, “You?”

“Hard. Very hard.” Jokes. Yes, his Ilya is definitely back.

Shane snorts, “Later.” Later when they have more energy. Later when it can be fun and teasing and passionate. Later when they’ve actually slept a full eight hours for the first time in days.

Ilya answers him with a squeeze of his arms, “I know. Thank you. You… you are too good to me, you know. So happy to do what I need from you.”

Subspace tugs at Shane sharply, giving one final valiant effort to drag him back. It doesn’t matter if he slips a little, really, so he lets it loosen his shoulders a fraction more. He likes being pliant under Ilya’s hands. He wants to draw this perfect moment out just as much as his Dom. 

They settle back in bed without much fanfare, this time tucked under the covers and wrapped up so close they are one tangle of limbs.

Yesterday felt impossible. Today was hard. Tomorrow will be better.

-

Summer is nice. Summer is a good look on Ilya. Summer has the windows open and a warm breeze flowing through the cottage even-though the sun is setting, and the pop and crackle of dinner on the stove.

Summer also means sweatpants and bare feet and lounging around on the sofa, which Shane loves but absolutely will not admit to, even when Ilya needles him about it. What he likes about it, really, is getting to be all tangled up in Ilya. He likes the weight of another person on his chest, likes to stroke Ilya’s curls while the Dom naps, likes everything about how simple it feels.

So, with Ilya moving about across the room in the kitchen, Shane had found himself not liking the sofa nearly as much, instead opting for checking his phone.

“That better not be more tweets!” Ilya yells, raising the wooden spoon he is cooking with. Shane feels his cheeks flame.

“It’s—“

“Ah ah, my threat was real. I will bend you over every surface in house if I have to, Shane.”

“Shut up.” Shane knows his cheeks are still red. It’s a hopeless cause, when Ilya says these things to get a reaction from him.

He shifts, walking around the edge of the sofa and hopping up into the kitchen, turning his screen towards Ilya, “Just look.”

scotthunterofficial:

Two weeks ago, a player tried to tear down another player. Because of who he is in a way that nobody can help, or change. Shane Hollander has won the last three cups with two different teams. The year before that, I won my cup. So, by my calculations, the last four cups have been won with submissives on the team. Three of them with submissive captains.

If there is one thing that was correct from that interview— it is groundbreaking. Not for a submissive, not for a minority player. His achievements would be groundbreaking for any player, and I hope ground will continue to be broken, so that hockey can be the best it can be for everyone.

“Hm.” Ilya’s fingers clench around the little phone, eyes scanning up and down the screen, “I knew I liked old dinosaur.”

Shane can’t help but scoff, pulling the phone away, “You hate him.” 

“Not true! I will spank.” Ilya raises his spoon again, but that threat is empty. Shane just laughs and bats it away. The tension seeps out of the room, an ease in the silence. Ilya keeps an eye on their dinner, stirring it slowly. He looks like maybe he wants to say something, brow furrowed, but it passes.

It gives Shane time to think. To reread the tweet still staring back at him from the phone screen. There’s a picture attached, too, snuck in at the bottom like an afterthought. Scott and another man, smiling into the camera, pressed up against each-other in the back of a car, donning tuxes and goofy smiles.

Had that been from the NHL awards? Had Shane been in the room, unknowing to the secret glances shared over everyone’s heads? He and Ilya had shared enough themselves. Shane knows the impossible weight of wanting to look over in a crowded room, of not being able to resist.

Before he can overthink it, he likes and retweets.

“You know. I think he tried to tell me.” He says next, drumming his fingers against the kitchen island, “Once. Maybe. I’m not sure.”

Headaches. Muscle cramps. Itchy skin. There was nothing else it could be. Shane knows that intimately.

Ilya keeps his eyes down on the stove, offering a one-shouldered shrug, the loose collar of his oversized hoodie slipping down his skin, “Who cares. Will take news off us. Maybe when we double date it will break the internet. His Dom is handsome man.”

In another lifetime, Shane is jealous. He is insecure of his place at Ilya’s side and he sickens himself to sleep thinking about all the others— Subs and Doms, because Ilya’s always been an overachiever— Ilya could be spending his time with.

As it stands, Shane scowls and bats at Ilya a second time.

“You cannot hit on his Dom.”

Rather than raise his wooden spoon again, Ilya just laughs. He never restrains himself here, behind closed doors. Just like how his sharky smile turns boyish, his barked laugh turns musical.

“Why not!” He whines like Shane is denying him much worse, like Shane is pulling away rather than creeping closer, “Old man is probably in hormonal decline. Young Dom like that needs better partner in bed.”

“Oh so now you’re high enough to Dom anyone?” He asks, tucking an arm around Ilya’s waist and pressing his nose into the sleeve of Ilya’s hoodie. Flowery detergent and garlic from the cooking and earthy from the lake. “He could be a seven or an eight, you know.”

Ilya doesn’t hug back. He throws his arms out, chin tilting back, “Psh, I can Dom an eight. I am Ilya Rozanov. I am nine-point-eight! One-point-eight percent more hormones!”

Shane laughs as they rock to the side, turning so he can wrap his other arm around Ilya’s chest. Somehow he manages to paint a scowl on his face, even if he knows his eyes are still laughing, “I hate you. Maybe I’ll take Hunter’s Dom to bed.”

The wooden spoon drops to the counter with a clatter, and suddenly Shane can’t breathe for how hard he is being squeezed back, two strong arms like a vice around his chest. He doesn’t care. He presses as close as he possibly can. Everything about Ilya is skin-warm and perfect.

“Ah, no, he is not high enough for my ten.” Ilya grumbles. A kiss is placed on Shane’s forehead, “That I know. I am only one you kneel for.”

Shane has to tilt his head back to meet Ilya’s eyes. They are not clouded with headspace, dominance, or arousal. They are clear and bright, the reflection of the overhead light dancing in them. It’s not a declaration of possession. It is just a fact. The sun rises. A minute is sixty seconds. Shane Hollander kneels for Ilya Rozanov.

“Yeah.” Shane isn’t responsible for the way his tone changes, the rasp of his throat around the words as it chokes up.

Ilya stares back for a long moment. Neither of them move, just their chests rising and falling in time with the other’s. Like the rest of the time they spend with each other, it is not awkward.

Eventually Ilya tilts his head to the side. His lips find Shane’s forehead again, slow as he puckers his lips and kisses him, lingering. “You are the only one for me, too.”

Shane snorts. He can’t help it. He squeezes the hand he has hooked around Ilya’s hip.

“Ilya.” He guffaws, “You’re high enough for anyone you want.”

That gets him a moment of genuine thought, a few inches of cold air between them as Ilya leans away, shuffling back to lean against the countertop.

Shane lets his arms fall to his sides, empty.

“Yes.” Ilya says, answering the question Shane had not asked, “Maybe. But that is not the point. You know why I get traded so much as a rookie? Was very confusing when I was high Dom but had no Sub my level. Nobody I found in clubs was high enough. Was so frustrated, I kept trying to Dominate all the other Doms on team. Was very… messy.”

Messy. Shane thinks about all the pictures he’d seen over the years— Ilya drunk. Ilya with every Sub in Boston stumbling out of club after club. He even remembers, vividly, Ilya arguing with his own teammates in fast Russian when they met at the International Prospects Cup.

Something else makes Shane pause, pulls him away from the thoughts he will absolutely be sorting out later. He raises an eyebrow, “Even your captains?”

Ilya shrugs, arms crossed over his chest.

Messy, repeats in Shane’s mind. Is he… embarrassed?

Shane feels his grin return in full force, pulling at his cheeks, taking over his whole face. This is possibly the best day of his life, Scott Hunter be damned.

“Oh my god, you were just as much of a mess as me!”

Ilya’s face pinches, “Okay, let’s not go quite that far—“

“You were a mess!” Shane laughs. His head lolls back as he laughs. How had nobody ever noticed? The signs were all there. God, he was an idiot. “Wiebe had to save you too!”

Ilya doesn’t seem to find it nearly as funny as Shane is. He scoffs and smacks his lips, but Shane isn’t blind, he sees the little twitch of a smile he is repressing.

Despite that, Ilya moves back to his cooking, turning the heat back up with one hand and grasping the wooden spoon with the other. In the process he shoulder-checks Shane, pushing him back against the counter. “Go away. I have changed my mind. I will find another partner.”

“Never.” Shane tilts forwards, leaning to catch Ilya’s eye, “I love you. Do you think if I asked Bood he’d tell me what you were like when you joined? I can’t imagine you trying to Dom him. Did you order him?”

Ilya’s smile breaks free, finally. He shoves at Shane again, this time playfully to his chest, “I am not that much of an asshole. Was more subtle. And did not mean it.”

Shane is not surprised when the hand shoving him does not retreat, instead gripping his shirt and tugging him close. Their feet bump and their legs tangle. He has to grab the edge of the counter to hold himself up. Ilya uses the distraction to kiss his cheek, smacking and loud.

Shane hums, feeling a bubble of warmth inside his chest. It rises up and expands, engulfing him, burning down his limbs and up his neck to his head. It feels… weightless.

“Mm.” His tongue feels the opposite— heavy, hard to move, “Do you mean it when you Dom me?”

“Of course. Always.”

Always, because they have always. They have forever if they want it.

The Subspace tickling at him makes it easy. Makes his limbs fold and bend exactly the way they need to, lowering him slowly to the floor. His wrists cross behind his back and his chin tilts up, back straight.

There is nothing frightening or fast with the way this Subspace eclipses him. His heart slows. His eyes blink slowly. The lingering smell of the honey from his tea is suddenly the strongest scent in the room, sweet and sticky.

Somebody drops something, maybe. The clatter is muffled, unimportant, so long as Ilya keeps staring down at him like that. Like the world has cracked open beneath his feet, eyes wide, lips parted.

“Fuck Shane, the chicken is half cooked—“

“That’s okay.” Shane slurs his words, but only a little. Only misses one or two syllables as his mumble comes out more like s‘kay. His cheek rubs against Ilya’s leg, settling there, resting, “I can wait. This is nice.”

Ilya can barely get the words out either as his voice catches on every word of his reply.

“I love you, too.”

-

The locker room is quiet. Hushed. The first practice of the season is always like this, no matter the team. It settles something in everyone, regardless of designation, regardless of levels, regardless of anything.

Because in this room, they are just hockey players.

And in this room, they are hockey players who might complain constantly about the game they love, but not-so-secretly miss it dearly during the off-season.

Shane’s head feels quieter than it has in weeks. All the tapes he’d watched over the summer, all the plays he’d noted down and committed to memory— he could finally put them into action. Standing there on the ice, surrounded by his team, listening to Ilya’s first captain’s speech of the season, he had never felt so sure that they’re going to go two-for-two this year. That cup is theirs.

Shane turns, reaching into the locker next to his. With two kit bags that are both Centaurs-red, mixups happen. Shane must’ve thrown his deodorant into Ilya’s this morning.

He finds the bottle on the top of the unfolded mass of clothes and pads Ilya keeps, only then glancing up.

Haas is looking at him from the other side of the room. Their eyes meet for not half a second before the rookie is glancing away, cheeks possibly redder than Shane’s have ever gone.

Shane frowns, glancing back to his own locker. Sure, he knows the rookie has a little bit of hero-worship for him, but it was never more than that, was it? He can’t remember ever feeling uncomfortable around Luca. Or feeling like the young Dom was actually trying to dominate him. No, that can’t be it. Ilya would have noticed and nipped it in the bud. He’s much better at reading social interactions like that.

“What Luca? Oh shit, Hollzy.”

Shane’s head jerks up, this time turning to face Hayes.

Hayes is not looking him in the eye. In fact, Hayes is pointedly staring somewhere else, eyebrows raised so high they’re practically disappearing into his hairline.

Shane thinks his cheeks might actually be as red as Haas’.

He immediately scrambles for his shorts and snatches them up from the bench. It’s not like him to forego underwear, but that’s the last thing on his mind right now. The last thing on his mind when he’d completely forgotten what Ilya had done two days ago at the cottage, and completely forgotten that it had left evidence.

Big, yellow, bruising evidence, top to bottom, meticulously spread out over his ass.

Shane groans, scrubbing a hand down his face, “Please don’t.”

It’s useless to ask. Ilya was standing right there, a look of delighted amusement on his face as he watches the scene play out in front of him. His grin is terrible. Ugly. Annoying. Stupid. Stupidly fucking handsome—

“Ah, do not be so embarrassed—" He coos, sickly sweet and decidedly teasing rather than sympathetic, his shoulder bumping with Shane’s.

Shane bumps him back, pushing him away, making space around his locker that isn’t taken up by an annoyingly large Russian hockey player, “Fuck off, Rozanov!”

“Yeah, looks like you’ve already made your point.” Dykstra adds from Shane’s other side. He sounds sympathetic, maybe, but also like barely-restrained laughter, “Whatever it was.”

“I’m going to kill you.” Shane mutters. He won’t, of course, but he will be throwing out all the wooden spoons in the cottage effective immediately.

-

Shane should have seen it coming. It’s their first game against Montreal since. Since the cup, since the outing, since.

It’s not the first time he’s played against Montreal as a Centaur, of course. They played plenty of games against them last season. This certainly will not be the last game they play this season either.

He is starting to think, however, that maybe Montreal is starting to wish it was.

Familiar faces cloaked in blue dot the rink, ordered back to their side of the ice by the refs. One is favouring his left side from a harsh slam into the boards. Bood. One has bloody gauze stuffed up his nose from an ‘accidental’ collision. Barrett.

One is still lying on the ice, so dazed that he just stares blankly up at the roof, curled around the shoulder that Shane definitely just heard pop out of place. Ilya.

“Fuck you! Eh? You know what that means? You speak English, yes? What about French! Mange de la marde! Décrise! Va chier mon tabarnak!”

The accent is awful. The words are only vaguely recognisable as French words, and only if you’re really paying attention. Shane is pretty sure Ilya doesn’t even know what they mean, doesn’t even know where one word ends and the next begins. He is probably just regurgitating any vaguely insulting phrase he has heard before, but it is amusing to listen to.

It can’t go on forever, though. Eventually Ilya is peeled back by the refs, thrashing as he tugs and pulls to get the very last word.

The funniest part is that Shane doesn’t even know this player. He might be donning the achingly familiar Montreal blue and white, but he’s a recent trade. He thinks maybe from Buffalo, or somewhere equally as terrible and dull.

Bood floats around behind him, their line purposeless without a puck to chase or players to fight. He taps Shane’s stick in greeting, “What the fuck did that guy say to you?”

Shane jerks out of his reverie. He has the AC on his shoulder, he reminds himself. He should not have left his back line and goalie to fester, wasting precious seconds when they could be strategising their next play. Ilya will certainly get a penalty and they need to have a strategy to make up for it.

While his brain runs a mile a minute for solutions and he starts waving over the rest of their team, his mouth moves for him, “How’d you know?”

Hey Hollander. Will you kneel for us when we win? Comeau says you cry easy. I’d like a picture of that. For my locker. Kneel.

Stupidly, it had been said in earshot of Ilya. A rookie mistake. The order had barely even registered with Shane. His muscles were already on fire from working hard, and it had been terribly obvious that this guy was a very low Dom and  overcompensating for that.

Ilya had other opinions.

Bood makes room for Hayes and Barrett to huddle up on their side, still laughing, “He’s only like that when they’re dicks to you.”

-

“Where’d you learn all that terrible French?” Shane is trying his best to sound disapproving but he’s not entirely sure that it’s translating past the grin on his lips. Or his cock, hard and pressing into Ilya’s stomach as he perches on Ilya’s lap.

Equally, Ilya is doing a terrible job at pretending to be chastised. His hands are everywhere, roaming any square inch of skin he can find on Shane, squeezing and pressing into the soft flesh and packed muscle. Shane does not let out a terribly embarrassing squeal when one of those roaming hands squeezes his ass. He does not.

But he does keel forwards, pressing as close as he can to Ilya’s chest, nose pressed into the curve of Ilya’s neck, lips mouthing at an already purpling bruise. He’d gone into the boards earlier, hard. Fucking Mitty. Shane had retaliated in the second period by narrowly cutting off his path along the ice, unbalancing him and getting him sent to the bench with a knee sprain, but still.

Ilya mumbles and pushes at his head, fingers sliding into his hair to tug him away. Shane resists, but only for a moment. Then he lets himself be moved, lets himself be kissed.

Ilya grins into the kiss just the same, teeth scraping with a wince. His own grin is bright and boyish. They’d won, and they’re sharing a hotel room, and everyone knows, and there is not one single thing weighing Ilya’s shoulders down. 

“You are right. Terrible language. I will never speak it again. Too confusing on the tongue.”

Shane’s hand twitches, glides across the smooth plane of Ilya’s bicep, fingers sinking into the muscle, “Oh, French is more confusing than Russian?”

“Da. That is yes. See? Is simple.”

Their hands continue to wander, words dying out. Ilya’s find a place to rest on his hips, fingers splaying over the yellowing patches of skin on Shane’s own body. He thinks they are from hockey, but he can’t be completely sure. Sometimes Ilya likes to bite and kiss his way over hockey bruises to claim them. Sometimes Ilya likes to take him in hand and make his own. Sometimes, Shane is not sure where hockey bruises end and his Dom’s bruises start.

What he does know for sure is that each of the bruises on his body are a trophy. A symbol. He gets to keep playing hockey. He gets to share his life with Ilya. He gets both.

“Mm…” Ilya’s noises turn thoughtful, and he presses the pad of his thumb into whichever of the marks takes his fancy. Shane feels the pressure just below his hip, bordering on the swell of his ass. It tenses, pressing further into the muscle, pushing relentlessly until it gives.

Shane can’t help but squirm as it aches. For a moment, he tries to pull away. His hands tense. He bites his lip. Then the the protest melts away. It almost feels like his brain melts away, too. Heat rises from the pit of his stomach all the way up to his cheeks, and his body slumps against Ilya’s.

Somewhere, he knows the strangled moan being breathed into Ilya’s cheek is from him.

Ilya’s smugness is palpable. He moves Shane’s head again, this time with no resistance as he moulds Shane this way and that, eventually tilting Shane’s head back so their eyes can meet.

His pupils are wide. He is not grinning anymore, his lips set in a thin, focussed line. Shane is not curled up on his boyfriend’s lap anymore. He is facing his Dom.

“Is it time of day where you remember to be good?” Ilya’s voice is rumbly and quiet, spoken from his chest, a place that is deep and intangible. A place that makes every word he speaks relax Shane further, pressing into him as firmly as his hands.

Close to an order. But not quite.

“Fuck you.” Shane’s brain is slow but the words are familiar, part of their constant push and pull. He cocks his head, unable to keep himself from smiling as he declares, “I’m always good.”

That makes Ilya pause. Just for a moment he looks soft again. Warm and cozy and emitting light into the room just by being there. Like a wilted flower, Shane would twist and turn in any direction to feel the sun’s warmth.

Then it is gone. Ilya’s face hardens again, settles. This, Shane wants as well. He craves both halves of their relationship, because how could he possibly not? It is almost overwhelming when he remembers how much he had resisted being himself. How much he had resisted Ilya. How much he had nearly missed out on.

“Yes.” Ilya nods, shifting back slightly, making room in their embrace, “You know, I think this is true. So. What do you want as your reward, moya lyubov?”

Shane pauses. Ilya’s fingers are still drawing firm circles into his bruise. The skin feels tight, warm. He is still achingly hard in his shorts. He knows what he wants, of course he does. He wants to feel good. He wants to fuck, he wants to play, he wants to be good.

In the end, Shane doesn’t even need his words to reply. All he needs is a tiny shake of his head.

Ilya exhales sharply. Harshly, like the wind has been knocked out of him. Shane can see the way he pushes out the air and sucks in the command, letting it build it in his chest.

“Lie down.”