Chapter Text
The night before his first skate as an Ottawa Centaur, Shane is tossing and turning in bed.
His husband lay next to him, drool shining on his lips as he snores softly.
Husband, Shane smiles to himself. It all still feels unreal.
To the rest of the world, it still is; their secret is still tucked safely away.
Shane’s thoughts are spiraling; everything was happening so fast, and the small hiccup in their plan was leaving him restless. Shane came out as gay to the Voyageurs right before the playoff run last season, and while he knew that some of them may be upset about it, he hadn’t expected them to be so cruel.
He had carried that team on his back since his rookie season, leading them to three cups and turning the organization around completely. All of that seemed to be erased by the fact that he was gay.
He could handle the slurs thrown his way, the jeers from players who he had seen as his brothers.
What he couldn’t handle was the silence.
The way that his arrival in the locker room seemed to suck the air out of the room. God, he still had that “C” on his chest, but he never felt smaller, so out of control.
Tripping over nothing during his final game donning the red and blue was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
“Can hear you thinking, Hollander,” Ilya grumbled, rolling to face Shane. He wrapped his arms lazily around Shane’s waist, trying to pull him close to his chest.
Shane sat up, reaching over to turn on the lamp by their bedside. Ilya groaned, rolling facedown into his pillow to block the light from permeating his sleep.
“I just want everything to go well tomorrow,” Shane said softly, unsure if Ilya had fallen back to sleep or not.
He waited a beat, before he heard a sigh from Ilya’s lips muffled slightly by the pillow.
“Is okay, моя любовь,” Ilya turned to face Shane, propping himself up on one elbow, “You are Shane Hollander. You can go on ice in sneakers and still be best one out there.”
Shane reached one hand down to cup Ilya’s cheek, biting his bottom lip a bit as he caressed his face with his thumb.
Shane wasn’t worried about the skating aspect of tomorrow. He was worried about his relationship with Ilya, how it would be perceived by the team. He knew there was no chance that he could pretend they weren’t anything; he could barely handle it when they were only seeing each other a handful of times each year and meeting behind closed doors in hotel rooms. There was absolutely zero chance he would be able to do it now, when Ilya had him wrapped so taut around his finger.
Ilya’s eyes fluttered shut under Shane’s gentle touch, but he knew the conversation wasn’t over.
Ilya sat up slowly, leaning back against the headboard and patting his lap, coaxing Shane to lay down, running his fingers lazily through his soft black locks.
Shane felt a wave of calm rush over him, his thoughts soothed by Ilya’s fingers in his hair.
“I don’t think that I can pretend that I’m not in love with you,” he half-whispered, shifting his position in Ilya’s lap so that he was looking up at his husband.
“So don’t,” Ilya said with a shrug, his eyes soft with adoration as he stared back at Shane. “I tell the team tomorrow, ‘my husband is so obsessed with me, we couldn’t keep this secret.’”
Shane scrunched up his nose, his cheeks pinking up as he rolled his eyes. Ilya only smiled back at him, moving one of his hands from Shane’s hair to run a finger across the freckles dotting his husband’s cheeks.
“They are nice team, very accepting,” Ilya repeated what he had told Shane so many times before, “No one will give us problems, mой дорогой.”
When Shane could stop his overthinking, he knew that Ilya was right. But fresh off his experience with the Voyageurs, he couldn’t help but consider that maybe Ilya was wrong. He had thought the Voyageurs were a nice enough team, or at the very least, nice enough to consider that him being gay had no impact on his value as one of them.
“It’s just – what if you’re wrong?” Shane said, his voice still quiet with worry, “I don’t think I can handle it if they react like the Voyageurs did. And the Voyageurs didn’t even know about everything. They didn’t know about us. What if that … makes it harder to bear?”
Shane knew he wasn’t being fair. Ilya deserved to love him out loud, to be loved out loud. Ilya deserved so much more than hiding in the shadows. He saw the way Ilya lit up when they hung around people who knew about them, the way he melted into Shane’s touch when there were others there to see it.
He wanted this feeling to go away; the feeling that he would always need to hide his love for his husband.
His teammates could bring their partners to games and team outings, and could kiss them in the street without worry.
He wanted that so desperately. He wanted the world to know about their love. He knew that Ilya wanted that too, in the way Ilya’s face fell slightly every time Shane shied away from him in public, dropped his hand when he heard footsteps coming towards them and never let his gaze linger. He wanted to be brave enough to share his love with the world.
Ilya didn’t say a word, just watched Shane with a quiet reverence as he stroked his hair and caressed his cheek.
There was no way he could hide this for very long. Ilya may have been teasing him, but he truly is too obsessed with his husband to feign indifference.
Shane let himself be soothed by the silence for a moment longer, his heart fluttering in his chest, butterflies flapping around in his stomach. The feeling was reminiscent of being a kid with a silly crush.
Shane giggled a little to himself, an idea forming in his mind as he sat in Ilya’s lap, bringing his hand up to coil one of Ilya’s curls gently in his finger. He pressed a chaste kiss to his husband’s lips, giggling again as his cheeks became rosy with a blush again.
“What is it, моя любовь?” Ilya grinned, lightly tapping his nose against Shane’s, “You are giggly, like schoolgirl.”
Shane leaned his head against Ilya’s shoulder, nuzzling into his neck.
“I have a crush on you,” Shane said with another giggle, his position hiding the blush that was surely deepening and spreading down his neck.
He felt Ilya tilt his head a bit, craning to look at Shane’s face.
“Is not secret, cолнышко,” he smirked, tapping his finger against Shane’s cheek to get him to lift his head, “You are not… discreet?”
Shane raised his head from Ilya’s shoulder, biting his lip as he stared at the Russian. He fluttered his eyelashes a bit, a goofy grin splitting his face.
“Do you have a crush on me, too?” He couldn’t help the giggle that escaped his lips then, cocking his head to the side. He was a little nervous for some reason, as if there was a universe where his husband didn’t like him back.
Ilya leaned in, kissing Shane softly on the tip of his nose and then on the lips.
“I have huge crush on you,” he said, kissing each of Shane’s rosy cheeks. “So pretty, so sweet. How could I not?”
Shane stole another quick kiss from Ilya, his smile widening.
“I’ve always wondered what it would be if we didn’t have to hide for so long,” Shane’s voice fell back into the soft whisper that they were using before, “Holding your hand in public, going on dates, telling my friends about the boy I like. Blushing when our arms accidentally brush in the rink, putting little notes in your bag before you leave. Surprising you with flowers.”
It was Ilya’s turn to blush then, raising an eyebrow at Shane, who is never usually so vocal about his desires, however innocent.
“Better be really nice flowers. Would be embarrassing to get ugly flowers from crush,” Ilya teased, resting his forehead against Shane, “But yes… I wonder this too, sometimes. If there was no league to make happy, no Russia… Just us.”
“What if we could do it?” Shane leaned forward, tightening his hold on Ilya, pressing their bodies closer together, “We wouldn’t actually start over, of course. But we could pretend. That way, we wouldn’t have to hide our feelings, but we could sort of test the waters? Maybe some innocent flirting and lingering gazes… we could have crushes on each other. Like, not secretly.”
Ilya scooted down the bed a bit so he could lay back down, the weight of Shane pressed against him soothing him like a weighted blanket. Shane stayed on top of Ilya, nuzzling against the warmth emanating from Ilya’s body.
“Is perfect plan,” Ilya said softly, kissing the top of Shane’s head.
–
Shane doesn’t remember either of them falling asleep, but they must have, the soft glow of the forgotten bedside lamp dulled by the light coming in through the windows as he woke up still tucked against Ilya’s chest.
He smiled to himself, cuddling impossibly closer as he let his eyes flutter closed, content to snuggle his husband – his crush – a little while longer.