Chapter Text
Ilya almost missed it. He wasn’t supposed to be sticking around after his post game interview to watch his sweaty arch"rival" brag to the press about his win against Boston tonight. Ilya was supposed to be heading to showers and sending baiting texts to Shane to get an invitation to his secret apartment later for commiseration sex.
So it was bad luck that he was standing off to the side of hordes of reporters, arms crossed with fake a snarl, when he saw Shane’s face go pale and ask the interviewer to repeat her question.
“We know your mother and father are your biggest fan — your mom is possibly hockey’s biggest fan. Do you think your stellar performance tonight was spurred on by their recent accident in hopes to inspire a quick recovery?”
“What accident?” Shane asked, confused and trying to not let the panic show — but Ilya could see the tremor starting in Hollander’s hands.
“The car accident, right before the game,” the interviewer stated as though that should have been obvious — though it would seem like she was the only one in the room with this information. But the shocked silence in the room only lasted a minute. The room erupted then as the other reporters and photographers went into action, hurling more questions and taking photos of Hollander’s reaction.
Rozanov was moving the moment he saw Shane’s assistant coach step in to pull Hollander away, tossing some polite niceties at the press before getting the stunned captain through the double doors that lead to the locker rooms — and where the media were not allowed to follow. Ilya shouldered past them, ignoring any attempt by the press to catch his attention. He was suddenly very grateful for the security at the door, even if it did seem a bit meager at the moment.
He wasn’t sure what he was going to do when he caught up to Shane, but he just knew he needed to be there — even if they had been in an awkward place since Florida.
Ilya saw Shane disappear down a hallway that led to the Voyageurs locker rooms just in time to start jogging to catch up. Unfortunately, just before he could round the corner, he heard behind him;
“Sir, there is no press allowed beyond this point, I am going to need to ask you to back up.”
“I just need to ask Mr. Hollander one question.”
Fuck that.
He spotted Shane and his assistant coach a moment later, Hollander pulling away from him in a panic.
“Just tell me!” Shane uncharacteristically yelled at him “Are they okay?!”
Rozanov couldn’t hear the answer, but from the sympathetic look on the coach’s face — God, why couldn’t he remember the bastard's name? — and the way Shane crumpled to the floor after, he knew it wasn’t good.
“Under no circumstances am I allowed to let any of you back there, now step back!” The security guard was raising his voice behind Ilya.
Just great. This was the last thing Shane needed, the press witnessing him breaking down after freshly finding out bad news about his parents. Ilya pushed aside his own feelings about his own mom’s death, and how he was suddenly grateful the only ones to witness his grief had been his asshole father and brother.
That’s how he found himself kneeling in front of Shane on the floor, who had his head between his knees and was having trouble breathing.
“Hollander, you need to stand up.” He knew he was being brusk, but they didn’t have time for the gentleness Shane deserved.
“Back off, Rozanov,” coach-whatever-his-name-was said while placing a firm hand on Ilya’s shoulder. He just brushed it off, and hoped the man wouldn’t get more physical with him.
“Shane, look at me,” he firmly, but kindly said while curling a finger under Shane’s panicking chin, “You need to stand. We will go to hospital. But you need to stand.”
There was more commotion echoing down the hall around the corner, it was possibly the only reason why the Voyageurs assistant coach left Ilya alone to deal with the insistent press.
Shane, through shaking and on the verge of crying, did his best to get to his feet — however, it was clear his body was betraying him. Between the adrenaline dump that could happen after a hard won game, and receiving horrific news in such a terrible way, it was clear Hollander was going to need help getting himself back together and out of this fucking hallway.
Ilya hauled him up by the armpits, only to have Shane collapse into him, breathing increasingly raggedly into his neck while the arguing behind him only increased in volume. Shit, shit, shit.
But Ilya didn’t have it in him to be harsh with Shane, not when he was pretty sure he was the only person Hollander would trust to comfort him this way. And, well fuck, this was not the time for the kind of feelings that brought about.
He pressed a quick kiss to Shane’s hair line, hoping that it conveyed everything he couldn’t say right now. Rozanov could see the locker room doors from where they were. If he could just get Shane somewhere more private, he could take care of him, get him to the hospital to see his parents. So Ilya hooked his hands under the barely standing man’s thighs to pick him up and take him where they needed to be.
Perhaps he should have known that would have prompted Shane to wrap his arms around his shoulders and try even harder to bury himself in Ilya’s neck, legs coming around to hook around the Russian’s waist in a way that was so familiar to them, it was second nature. But Shane was starting to shake violently now while starting to cry, and Ilya only had one goal — to make those tears stop by any means necessary.
He almost got the locker room doors pushed open before he heard clicking behind him. But that was quickly forgotten as he now had a much more immediate problem on his hands.
“What the fuck Rozanov?! You aren’t supposed to — Shane?!”
“Is he hurt? The fuck did you do to him?!”
“Rozanov, if you —”
Of course the locker room was half full of freshly showered Montreal Voyageurs, all looking at Rozanov like he had killed their captain and was now carrying in his corpse to show off. Shane tried to pick up his head, but ended up just shuttering through a sob that did not help Ilya’s predicament.
“Pike,” Rozanov decided he was just going to be an asshole instead, “Get Hollander’s things. Meet me in the showers.” He started to move despite the protests around him, but he realized they were just going to follow him. So he added for good measure, “You don’t trust me, no. But you trust Pike. I can’t murder Hollander with a witness, so give us privacy."
That oddly seemed to shut everyone up momentarily, so Ilya capitalized on it, and marched into the showers still carrying a trembling Shane with Hayden following closely behind.
“Watch the doors. No one comes in.”
“What the actual fuck, Rozanov?! What happened?” Pike asked, half furious and half terrified for his best friend.
Ilya ignored him to set Shane down on one of the benches in the shower room, grateful that it seemed like everyone else had showered while the Captains talked to the press, so the space was empty. He then got on his knees to work on the laces of Shane’s shoes once he was confident the other man wasn’t going to slump over. Thankfully Hollander answered for him, because Rozanov really wasn’t sure of anything other than Shane was hurting and he needed to fix it.
“My parents-, they, oh god. They were in an accident driving to the game,” Shane shakily said, and then quickly spiraled now that he was speaking, “Critical condition. I- I didn’t know. I would have-, no one told me-”
“Shhh, it’s okay Lyubimy.” Ilya wanted to cradle Shane’s cheek, wipe away the tears streaking his face. He settled for a hand on his knee since they were being watched, “We are going to get you to hospital. But first, wash the game off you. I will help you.”
Shane was clearly in shock, and there was no way he was going to be able to drive or function until Ilya could get his body to calm down.
“The fuck you are,” Hayden practically growled from where he was standing in eyeline of the door and of his friend.
“Hayd, it’s okay.” Shane slurred with his eyes shut. “I want him to.”
Fuck. Oh this was not good. Ilya had seen what dissociation looked like on Shane, and he really needed Shane not to slip there right now. He started to rub Hollander's thighs to give him enough stimulation to come back into the present. Which was the wrong move in Pike’s eyes.
“No, no. He isn’t putting his hands on you. No way. Rozanov, switch places with me.”
If Ilya didn’t need Pike at that moment, he would have just gone across the room and knocked him out. How did he not see he was trying to help?
“I can not do that. Anyone come in would not listen to me here.” God, he hated how bad his english got when he was stressed.
“Please, Hayden. We do this all the time, it’s fine.” Shane’s voice was also hoarse, slurred, and he sounded exhausted. Pike looked at them both confused, obviously not understanding their sudden familiarity. But Shane was oblivious to it. Ilya did his best to not cringe at his … whatever Shane was to him, almost outing them. “Ilya, I need you to —”
“I know. I know. I am here.” He had to take a deep breath, then he stood knowing that a stern tone would get Hollander on his feet. “Take off your clothes for me. Shower time.”
Hayden made another disapproving grunt and was openly staring at them, but didn’t intervene again when Ilya glared back at him while helping Shane get his sweaty shirt off. He was still in just his compression gear that was soaked through from their game. He let Shane shakily work on his socks while Ilya turned around and started the hot water in one of the shower stalls. They were the kind that only had a half wall in way of privacy between stalls, which meant Pike was going to get half a show. Nothing he could do about that.
By the time he got Hollander standing to pull off his compression shorts, he was silently crying again, but this time Rozanov couldn’t take it.
“Shane,” Ilya pleaded, on the verge of tears himself, “It is going to be okay.”
“What if one of them dies before I get there? What if they are already dead?”
He had no answer to that. But he recognized the desperation, the grief, in Shane's eyes. He had felt that before. And a version of it every day since his mother had died.
“I can’t lose them Ilya. I just can’t.”
“Then you won’t.” Ilya said looking into tear filled eyes that didn’t deserve to go through that pain.
“Ask someone to get update,” he commanded Pike, who didn’t move fast enough for Rozanov’s liking, “Now!”
Pike took another second to war with himself about leaving the two of them alone together, before exclaiming, “Shit!”, and disappearing back to the locker room.
Even though they didn't have their lookout anymore — or perhaps especially because they didn’t — Ilya took the chance that was presented, and Shane’s jaw, to give him a kiss. It wasn’t particularly passionate — now was not the time for that — but it was heartfelt. And by measure of how Shane seemed to relax a bit under it, Ilya thought it was one of their better kisses.
“Okay, okay. Now we shower.” He quickly stripped himself of his own clothing, not caring about what Pike would think about that. Shane was a bit unstable on his feet, and still not breathing properly, but Ilya managed to get him under the warm water. Still, Shane made no move to actually wash himself, his eyes squeezed shut, no doubt conjuring all the worst possibilities in his own mind.
Ilya placed a kiss each place before he washed it. Between Shane’s shoulder blades when he lathered up the man’s back, his hip when his legs were washed off, just above his heart when Ilya turned him around to clean off the sweat from his chest. Shane’s body slowly started to stop shaking, even if he still wasn’t entirely present.
The locker room door slammed open, and for a second Ilya worried that a mob of Voyageurs were going to come in and beat the shit out of him for showering with Shane. Instead, it was just Pike.
“I don’t have a lot of details, but Coach says —why are you naked with him?”
“So he doesn’t fall over, smash head, and end up in hospital himself,” Illya snapped, which caused Shane to flinch hard enough to come back to the present, “Focus, Pike. What did he say about the other Hollander’s?”
“Right, um, Yuna is stable and awake. Sounds like she fucked up her shoulder and had a pretty bad laceration that bled a lot and she need a blood transfusion and a bunch of stitches.”
Shane’s eyes slipped shut again, but Ilya wasn’t sure if it was from relief or that the mental image of his mom almost bleeding out was too much. Either way, Ilya stabilized him with hands on his hips in case he was going to pass out.
“This is good, yes? She is stable. Zayka, she is okay. Okay?”
Pike was glaring at him, either for the Russian or the touching, but he didn’t care because he got a little nod out of Shane before he braced himself for his next question.
“And my dad?”
“He was in surgery. Coach didn’t have many details other than it will be a few hours till he is out.”
Shane slumped forward into Ilya’s chest, his breathing starting to pick up speed again. Instinctively, he wrapped one arm around Shane’s waist, and the other came up to cradle the back of his head that was now resting on Ilya’s shoulder.
“This too is good. They do not do surgery on dead men,” he tried to reassure, but Shane let out a heartbreaking sob instead. Pike looked entirely conflicted on what to do, which Ilya thought was stupid. Had he gotten to Hollander first, he would have done the same thing Rozanov was doing, anyone on their team would have. He was just upset that it was Rozanov.
Okay, maybe not the exact same thing. Less kissing and naked full body contact probably. Hopefully.
It took more reassurances to get Shane’s breathing back to somewhat normal and where he could stand on his own again. Once there, Ilya gently pulled back and held him by his cheeks so that he would look the other man in the eyes.
“Lets get you rinsed off, pants on, and to hospital for more answers, yes?” Shane once again nodded his head and stepped back into the stream of water to finish what they started. Ilya quickly grabbed a towel out of Shane’s bag, not caring that he was flashing Pike in the process, and held it out to Shane when he turned off the shower.
At this point, Ilya knew Shane’s post game bag as well as his own, having helped him pack it or re-pack it several times after one of their hook ups. So when he slumped back on to the shower bench, clearly still a bit numb but holding back more tears, it was easy enough to find his fresh clothes and hand them over. There was a set of clean sweats and a t-shirt in there as well — Shane’s clearly having thought through what he was going to wear post-sex if Ilya had asked him to stay the night, something Ilya could not think about right now. He stole them for himself, praying it wasn’t a Montreal shirt.
Shane’s hands were still trembling too much to tie his laces, so Ilya knelt again to do it for him. Those hands found his shoulders, and Shane bent over to rest his forehead against him while he was clearly trying to focus on own his breathing.
“Shane—” Pike started, but the door to the locker opened around the corner, and he rushed to keep whoever it was out.
Shoes tied, and probably their last moment alone for a long time, Ilya looked up at Shane and his tear filled lashes. He surprised himself with the thought that Shane was still beautiful, even like this.
“Pretty crier,” he commented softly, wiping a stray tear from his cheek, “But much prefer to see this when you are on your back and in my bed.”
That got a startled laugh out of Shane, finally. This time when their foreheads came together, it was with a small smile on both their faces.
“This is so fucking weird,” Pike interupted. Shane was finally with it enough to realize what his best friend had been witnessing the last ten minutes or so.
“Hayden, I—”, he started, but Ilya wasn’t interested in finding out if Shane was going to try and lie or not.
“Not important. Who was that?”
“Um, JJ. He dated some nurse at Montreal General, and they are still friendly—”
“Get to the point, Pike.” Ilya growled and ignored the way the other man looked like he wanted to strangle Rozanov.
“He texted her, and she said David had a broken rib and punctured lung, also a broken leg. But after surgery he should be out of the woods. He is going to meet us at the hospital.”
“See! Hockey injuries. He will be fine, Shane. You all know how to deal with hockey injuries!” Ilya was trying again to be encouraging even though it clearly wasn’t a strength of his, while pulling Shane to his feet. Another chuckle. Perhaps he wasn’t so bad at this after all.
“Sure, but he isn’t a hockey player, and definitely not in the age range to be one.”
“Pshhh, but he is a Hollander. Means he is too stubborn and annoying to let a little hole in rib keep him down.”
“Hole in his lung.” This was good. If Shane was arguing with him, it meant he was feeling enough like himself that he would be okay enough to get to the hospital.
“Whatever. Sounds like fingers and brain are fine, so he can still read boring New Yorker while healing. Easy.”
“Nothing about this is easy.”
“Except you.” It slipped out, Ilya caught up in the banter. Shane immediately turned a shade of pink that had nothing to do with the hot shower.
“What the fuck is going on?” God Pike, why couldn’t he see now was not the time.
“What is going on is that you are going to drive Hollander to Hospital, yes?”
“Oh, so he is Hollander again?” Pike said suspiciously.
“Is that not his name?” Ilya turned to Shane, “Did you get name changed? Married? Forget to tell me?”
“Stop being an asshole, both of you. Can we please get out of here?” Shane whined. Ilya liked it when he whined.
“Of course, buddy,” Pike sighed, dropping the subject, “We can take the service corridors so that we can avoid people’s questions and get Rozanov back to his own locker room unseen.”
Ilya rolled his eyes, but did take the bait further than that. That was until Pike pointed at his borrowed shirt. Fuck, it was a Voyageurs team shirt. Oh well.
“Hey, do you need me to call Lily?” Pike asked of Shane while he gathered his stuff.
“What?” Shane replied, confused.
“You know, your Boston girl. You were texting her a bunch before the game, didn’t know if she came up for the game—”
“No, no. It’s fine. Lily, uh Lily already knows.” Impossibly, Shane was blushing even harder, which made Ilya snicker.
“How?”
“Jesus, Pike. You really are as stupid as you look,” Ilya snipped, fully laughing now.
“Didn’t I just tell you to stop being an asshole, asshole?” Shane bit back, even though he was holding back a smile.
“Since when do I do what you say?”
“Oh god, shut the fuck up,” Shane looked like he wanted to slap a hand over Ilya’s mouth, but he was actually smiling now. Even if it was just for a moment.
“So fucking weird,” Pike shook his head, but led them all to the service corridors. When they got where Ilya had to take a different turn to get to the opposing team’s locker rooms, they all stopped awkwardly, neither Shane or Ilya wanting to say goodbye. They weren't going to see each other for at least a month, and tonight and the following night was supposed to tided them over.
“Can’t you co—”
Ilya cut him off, “You know I can’t.”
“Yeah, okay.” He hated how sad Shane sounded, “Thanks, um, for helping out.”
“Of course, Hollander. Does not mean I will take it easy on you next time on the ice though.”
“No, of course not.”
“I hope your parents have a quick recovery,” Ilya added, because it felt wrong to not to. He wanted to pull Shane into a hug, tell him of course he would go to the hospital with him. Fuck the media, fuck what people would say. Being there for him was more important. But that would have just caused Shane more stress and problems. He had Pike anyways, he wouldn’t be alone at least.
“Thanks,” then incredibly awkwardly, “Bye, Rozanov.”
Ilya tried to not let his disappointment show as he nodded goodbye and turned towards where he was supposed to go. For ten whole seconds, he had to focus on his own breathing and keeping one foot in front of the other. He could have his own pity party once he got out of this stupid Montreal shirt and back to his own hotel room. On second thought, maybe he would keep the shirt, it was the closest he was going to get to Shane for another month.
But then there was cursing behind him and pounding footsteps. He turned quickly around to find out what had gone wrong, and was nearly slammed bodily by Shane Hollander. There were warm lips on his, and strong fingers in his hair. Ilya couldn’t help but sigh into the kiss as the world righted itself just a little by letting him have Shane properly in his arms, even if it was just for a few moments.
They kissed for probably a bit too long, before a panting Shane pulled away to say, “Come to my cottage this summer, so I can properly thank you.”
He didn’t wait for an answer, just kissed Ilya one more time before turning around and sprinting back to Pike.
“Okay, now this is way too fucking weird.”
“Later, Hayd. I’ll explain later.”
Ilya stood there, grinning like an idiot until he couldn’t see Shane’s ass anymore.