Chapter Text
“Do not make me ask you to leave again, David. Please do not make me—” Ilya broke off, his voice catching painfully in his throat. He could barely make out David’s silhouette through the film of tears blurring his vision, the porch light haloing him into something unattainable. And unattainable David was.
“Why?”
Ilya should have known, should have prepared for this possibility, but he had been naive in a way he had not been since he was twelve, since the day he had sat on the edge of his mother’s bed, sure she would wake up soon from her nap. He was still waiting, and he understood now that he always would be. Perhaps he would have to wait for David as well. In another life, he told himself, and knew it was a lie. Would Shane also make him wait? Even if he did, Ilya knew he would wait for Shane forever.
“We should not— Shane said I cannot— He does not want me to spend time with you—his parents— anymore.”
Shane wouldn’t say that. David’s first instinct was denial. “Ilya, that doesn’t sound like Shane. Maybe it was a misunderstanding?”
Ilya let out a small, broken sound that might have been a laugh if it hadn’t collapsed halfway through. He swallowed and straightened, his voice flattening into something that reminded David of the young Russian boy he once was, unsure of his welcome, protecting himself against a world he was sure was against him. Maybe because it was.
“I don’t want you to spend time with my parents anymore,” he said, carefully, the faintest lilt of Shane’s voice curling around the words. “Is exactly what he said. How you say— quote.”
“Ilya.”
David took half a step forward before stopping himself, unsure if moving closer would make things worse. How could Shane have said such a thing to the man he loved?
Ilya’s lower lip wobbled, betrayed him, and then the tears spilled over. He shook his head as if he could physically dislodge them, as if refusing to cry might make this less real.
“I am sorry,” he said again, the words tumbling over each other. “I love Shane and I cannot—” He pressed his lips together, inhaling shallowly through his nose. “He is all I have left, and I cannot—” His voice broke completely this time. “I am really sorry.”
This is my fault, Ilya thought dimly when David stared blankly at him with eyes that were exactly like Shane’s, the inevitability settling into him with the dull certainty of something he had already accepted. He had let himself get comfortable. He had let himself want things—Sunday dinners, puzzle evenings and movie nights, the warmth of belonging that had crept up on him. He should have known better. Nothing stayed, not even his mother, and she must have wanted to stay and love him, hadn’t she? Hadn’t she?
“Ilya,” David said gently. Helplessly again, when Ilya shook his head, “I’m sure he didn’t mean it like that. Shane might’ve been trying to say something else.”
But Ilya’s fingers were curled so tightly around the door handle that his knuckles had gone white, as if it were the only thing anchoring him. He wasn’t looking at David, his gaze fixed somewhere over his shoulder.
Ilya’s curls lay flat against his head, as though they had absorbed too much of the boy’s sadness. Slightly folded inward, shoulders drawn in, Ilya looked younger than he was, like his shoulders had reached the limit of what they could carry and had no idea what to do with the rest.
“Thank you, David. I love—,” Ilya stopped himself, choking on the words, each one scraping him raw on the way out. “Thank you for being there for me. Even if it was only for a little while.”
It hit David like a punch to the gut. Was. Was. Was.
He opened his mouth to protest, to tell Ilya he was family, that it wasn’t over, or something equally insufficient, but Ilya had already turned away, and the door closed softly behind him, the click echoing far louder than it should have.
David stood on the porch for a long time after that, the cold creeping up his spine through the puffer. He had come by to ask why Ilya had been so busy lately, ask him why he had been cancelling, why every plan had turned into a rain check for nearly a month. Ilya had said he wasn’t home today, and David had believed him, right up until he had driven here, prepared to wait for Ilya to return home and seen Ilya’s car in the driveway. He remembered smiling, already planning to tease Ilya for getting caught in a lie.
This was not how it was supposed to have gone.
His chest felt tight, and a horrible thought took root. Had Shane not misspoken? What had Shane done to this sweet boy David had started to think of as his own?
He shouldn’t be driving, he thought absently, because he couldn’t remember starting to drive. He supposed he knew that he had been stopping at lights, that his hands stayed steady on the wheel, that his phone sat face up in the cup holder.
Shane’s name was right there, only a few taps away. David kept glancing at it, his fingers twitching each time the car slowed, but every time his thoughts caught on white knuckles on a door handle, a boy folding in on himself like he had learned to take up as little space as possible.
What in the absolute fucking hell were you thinking?
The words lined up easily. Too easily for a man who had always been careful with his temper. He knew the damage words could do, had taught Shane how little it took to say something that could never be unsaid. David could hear himself already on the call with Shane, furious, and he hated how righteous he would sound. How justified. Hated that it would feel correct in the moment. But what if David was wrong? What if Shane had meant something else?
What if this was all just a knot of bad phrasing and worse timing, words lost in translation across a call, except David didn’t even know if it had been said over a call, because suddenly it felt like he didn’t know his son at all. His mind was cruel and supplied the reminder that he hadn’t known Shane was gay, that Shane had been with Ilya Rozanov for nearly a decade before David had stumbled into the truth. So maybe he really didn’t know his son.
What if David barrelled in to defend Ilya and caused irreparable damage? He imagined Ilya’s face again, the careful politeness David had thought they’d banished, all the work he had done to coax out the little chirps from Ilya that made his day, the memes he didn’t understand but enjoyed because Ilya took the time to explain, the partner in puzzles and cooking, things neither Shane nor Yuna had the patience for. The friend. The bonus son he thought he would always have. He still had, he reminded himself. He remembered Ilya’s face as he had apologised, an apology meant for David but really for himself.
He could not take anything else away from Ilya.
The city sliding past his windshield in familiar shapes should have been the same one he had known since childhood, but it seemed different tonight. At a red light, David picked up the phone, his thumb hovering over Shane’s contact. Then the light changed, and he set the phone back down, untouched.
“Not like this,” he murmured to the empty car.
Their house was dark when he got home. He toed off his shoes, hung his jacket by habit, and made it halfway down the hall before something in him finally gave out. Yuna was in the living room, curled into the corner of the couch, watching Shane’s game, the one they should have been watching with Ilya right now. David had imagined surprising her by bringing Ilya home early, had imagined the delight on her face when she saw him. He let out a sob he hadn’t realised he’d been holding. Yuna looked up as soon as she heard him, her expression shifting immediately.
“David?” She set the remote aside. “What happened?”
He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. The tears surprised him with their force, as though they were done waiting for permission. He crossed the room in three steps and folded into her, gripping the back of her sweater like he needed the reassurance that she was here.
Yuna’s arms came around him without hesitation, one hand rubbing firmly between his shoulder blades, the other cradling the back of his head.
“David,” she said softly, “what’s wrong?”
He shook his head against her shoulder, a broken motion. He couldn’t find words that wouldn’t shatter into accusations or grief. All he could see was Ilya standing white-knuckled in a doorway, thanking him for being there as though it were already over.
He tried to speak. He really did, but the story tangled in his throat, too many emotions pressing for space. “I can’t,” he whispered, ashamed of how small it sounded.
“All right,” Yuna said simply, easing his head into her lap, her fingers carding gently through his hair. He turned into her, away from the television, away from Shane’s face on the screen.
He had to fix this.
He didn’t know how yet, but when he woke, when the anger cooled, he would call his sons.
Both his sons.