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It's been an odd season. Yuna is used to not having very much time with Shane in the summer. Maybe an occasional long weekend, or a week at most, squeezed in around his other plans and obligations. But this year, Shane's season ended much earlier than anyone could have expected, so there are no plans, nothing already on the schedule, just a long stretch of time out at the lake house while he rests up and heals. He should even be able to look at screens for an hour or two by the time the finals come around, which will be nice. They'll get to watch as a family.
Thank goodness, Boston also gets knocked out of the playoffs early, and the two teams battling for the Cup end up being San Francisco and New York. Yuna really believes it's Scott Hunter's year, but if Boston was in the playoffs too? If there was even a chance that Ilya Rozanov could end the season with the same number of Cup wins as Shane, after his own teammate was the one to knock Shane and the Metros out of the running? No, Yuna would be too stressed out to really enjoy it.
(Though of course Shane would still be the only current captain who'd ever managed to lead his team to back to back Cup wins.)
Still, if it can't be Shane, Yuna is glad it's going to be Scott Hunter. Hunter is a very private person, which is understandable due to all the invasive press exploiting his parents' deaths, early in his career. It was shameful the way people constantly brought it up, trying to add a cheap dramatic angle to whatever story they were writing. To this day, Hunter generally avoids interviews and stays off social media, which means most people don't know the real extent of his contributions to the charitable causes close to his heart. Yuna does, though. And there have been a few notable times, maybe three or four over the course of his career, when he's used his position of privilege to make some extremely pointed statements: speaking out against hazing, or condemning the use of hateful language about immigrants. Yuna has always quietly appreciated him for that.
Turns out there's something else that's notable about Scott Hunter.
Yuna watches, open-mouthed. On the TV, the crowd's roar surges. They're on their feet in groups in section after section, shaking the rafters for Scott Hunter and his... boyfriend? Partner? The man he loves, undeniably. As the cameras circle them, Hunter is laughing, shocked and joyous, like he can't believe anything so good could be happening in real life. Fuck, he didn't even look this pleased to be winning the Cup!
Yuna can only sit and stare as Hunter leans in to press more kisses on the handsome young man in the denim jacket, their mouths meeting passionately again and again. Beside her, Shane's phone starts to buzz in his hand, and he gets up and goes into the hall, saying something low that Yuna doesn't hear. Then their front door opens and closes, letting in a breath of cool summer night air that brushes against her arms.
"Would you look at that," David says incredulously as three other Admirals glide into frame. Carter Vaughn slams into Hunter's side, pounding his back, his expression delighted. Greg Huff looks half-overcome, teary-eyed and beaming as he reaches out to grip Hunter's shoulder. Eugene Bennett is hovering a bit behind them, and as Hunter and his boyfriend pull apart, the boyfriend slips and wobbles a little on the ice. He clutches at Hunter's jersey, and Bennett reaches out to steady him with a hand under his elbow.
"Holy shit," Yuna blurts out, "he's wearing loafers!"
And now she's shocked all over again, because surely that completely insane choice of footwear implies— it means that Hunter and his boyfriend didn't plan this out! This wasn't something they planned! He just called his boyfriend down to the ice on an impulse, making a wild romantic gesture. Yuna flinches in sympathy as the young man in the denim jacket suddenly looks around, staring open-mouthed at the cameras and the fans like he just realized they still exist. Hunter says something, still holding his hand, and Huff slings an arm around his shoulders. Vaughn puts his hand on Hunter's back, and the whole group stays close as they head towards the Admirals tunnel.
The broadcast ends. The screen cuts to a commercial. Yuna blinks away the glaring afterimages left behind by the screen full of white ice and twists around, staring at the front door. Who is Shane talking to? She puts her untouched glass of wine down on the coffee table, but David reaches out before she can stand, brushing her knee with the tips of his fingers. "Honey, let him be."
"But..." Yuna begins. Then she stops. She doesn't know what to say. This changes things. Doesn't it? This has the potential to change everything. They don't know for sure yet, because Shane hasn't said anything, but. It's possible that this might change things for Shane, specifically.
"Let's just... let him have a minute," David says.
Yuna nods reluctantly and reaches for her glass of wine.
There's a short delay where no one seems sure what's happening as far as the post-game show, but Hunter shows up for his individual interview just a few minutes late. He's been tucked into his usual conservative charcoal suit jacket and white shirt, hair still damp, the knot of his tie uncharacteristically loose around his unbuttoned collar. There's instantly a thousand microphones in his face, a hundred questions being shouted at once. All Hunter can do is grin.
"David. Go tell Shane—" Yuna says, reaching out to him. But David just glances up past her, and Yuna jumps as Shane says "I'm back," standing right behind her. He sounds a little congested. She doesn't turn around. "Holy shit, right?"
"I mean, yeah. Wow."
"That was really something, all right," David says. "Good for him."
Yuna waits for Shane to come sit down next to her again, but he just stays where he is, hovering in the shadows of the darkened living room. On the TV, the reporters are clamoring: "Scott, Scott, obviously an incredible series for you, but people want to know, what happened on the ice— Scott, right after the Cup ceremony, you— Can you tell us about that? Can you tell us who that was?"
"We just won the Stanley Cup!" Hunter says, eyes wild and grin sharp, obviously completely cross-faded on a very familiar post-Cup mix of adrenaline, exhaustion, triumph and maybe half a bottle of hastily chugged champagne. He leans in towards the microphones. "You guys saw the game, right? Hell of a third period. Any questions about that? Question about the game? Anyone?"
"What, uh, Scott! What's it like to win the Cup?" someone immediately shouts, like a child urgently stuffing brussels sprouts into their mouth so that they can get to the ice cream faster.
"Great question," Hunter beams. "When the horn went, God, I think I blacked out a little. I mean, it's been the goal of my whole career to bring the Cup back to New York, so I, wow, I don't even think I can describe how it feels. Honestly, I think it's gonna take some time for it to sink in that we did it, and it's— it's actually, like, real—"
"—and Scott, was that your partner? Was that your partner that you brought onto the ice?" is the instant follow-up.
Hunter's smile stretches, if possible, even wider. He cups his hand at his ear. "What? Sorry, I heard: can you talk about the season? Absolutely I can, and first and foremost I want to say how proud I am of our whole team, everyone who contributed. All the guys in the room, our coaches, every member of our amazing support staff. This wasn't a painless series by any means, and there were times it would've been easy to just give up hope, but—"
The reporters clamor, cutting him off: "Scott! Come on! Give us something! Just one question, Scott, about the celebrations after—! Scott, are you—?"
Next to Yuna, David's eyes flick up to Shane. Did he flinch? Yuna tries to breathe normally. She doesn't turn around. On the TV, Hunter is laughing. "All right, jeez! I'm gonna say three things, okay, and then we're all gonna talk about hockey. Can we do that? Fuckin' A! Oh, shit, sorry." Beaming, he tilts his face up to the ceiling as if asking the heavens for patience, then scrubs his hands over his face before staring into the camera again. "Number one! Yes, I'm gay, and I guess I'm ready to say it! It's twenty-fucking-seventeen—"
(Whoever is manning the button that bleeps out curses from the live broadcast— well, they were clearly not expecting Scott Hunter to say fuck multiple times, but they do manage to react just quickly enough that Yuna doesn't think anyone will get fined.)
"—and yes, that's my partner. He's, his name's Kip, we've been together about three years now—"
"Three years," Shane echoes blankly from behind Yuna, starting to lean forward over her shoulder.
"—and this, this is one of the absolute best days of my life and I wanted to share it with him, okay? Is that weird? I don't think it's that weird!" Hunter is breathing deeply, chest heaving, but he's still smiling like a shark, like nothing short of Armageddon could make him stop. "Number two! I'm gonna thank everybody in advance for how respectful they're gonna be! Love it when my privacy is respected, so ahead of time I'm gonna say, great job, guys, thanks for that. And number three..." He stops, squints. "I'm kinda going off the top of my head here, I don't think I have a number three, actually, so... happy fuckin' Pride to me, love is love, and the Admirals won the fucking Stanley Cup tonight! I would really love to get some questions about that!"
"Scott, um— okay, going off what you said there," someone ventures, "this was a series with a lot of momentum swings along the way—" Hunter laughs out loud, shoulders dropping as the question goes on and continues to actually be about hockey. "When did you really start to believe—?"
"Three years!" Shane repeats quietly. "Fuck. Before Sochi, even? Holy shit." His phone buzzes. Yuna holds herself very still as Shane checks his texts, then inhales, seemingly taken aback.
"Who's that?" she asks lightly.
"Hayden. He says: What is happening? Is that a pod person? Since when does Scott Hunter drop F bombs to press?"
David chuckles. Yuna remembers a second late that she should laugh too.
"You all right, honey?" David says, looking at her in a very casual, very relaxed way.
"Well, of course I'm happy for him, but—" Yuna says, and instantly panics. Wrong move! She shouldn't have said but! Nothing good ever comes after that! She knows without looking that Shane is tensing up, bracing hard for the rest of her sentence. These could be some of the most important words her son ever hears her say. "But, well, I guess I'm worried for him, too. It seems like it sort of happened on impulse. I hope they planned their next steps out, at least a bit. It always helps to have a plan for, well— things like this."
"Things like this," Shane says, almost laughing. Well, he's right. Maybe there hasn't ever been a thing like this, before.
"It does seem like he's going to have support from his teammates," David chimes in.
"What?" Shane says blankly.
David clears his throat, coughing into his hand. "Oh, that's right, you didn't see. Some of the other Admirals— well, it really looked like, to your mom and me, that they were pretty happy for Hunter."
"Vaughn and Huff and Bennett," Yuna adds. "Obviously they knew. Good for Hunter. It's good that he has a support network. You know how he's always spoken out, asking for people to be treated respectfully. He certainly— I hope he continues to be treated with the exactly the same respect he's always deserved."
And there will be all the time in the world, later, to worry and wonder if that's going to be the case.
David nods. "That's true. Scott Hunter has always been a stand-up guy."
Yuna risks half a glance back at Shane, making her voice light. "Apart from that time you had to drop gloves with him."
"That was more of a misunderstanding," Shane says. "I think." He's looking down at his phone screen, distracted, and his throat clicks as he swallows hard.
"I'm sure he'll post some kind of statement. Maybe not tonight, but probably tomorrow?" Yuna muses. "Or maybe the Admirals will. I'll keep an eye out. You can make a comment, or quote tweet and say something supportive. That'd be nice, don't you think?"
"Sure," Shane says absently. He turns and takes a step or two towards his room, thumb moving over his phone's keyboard, then pauses. "Yeah. Let's do that. I hope— Of course I hope things go well for him too."
It isn't much later that Shane can finally take his arm out of the sling, and he instantly announces that he's heading over to his cottage to get out of Yuna and David's hair. Yuna absolutely expected this. She really has been doing her best not to hover and micromanage Shane's recovery too much. But she and Shane have a lot in common, personality-wise, and Yuna knows that she would've been a lot more than mildly irritable if she'd had to move back in with her parents for any amount of time as an adult, and even more so if she'd had to depend on them to fix her meals, do her laundry, tie her shoes. It's really no wonder Shane's been disappearing into his phone most days, scrolling and texting constantly like a teenager.
They stay in contact, though, and then one day Shane comes over and announces that he's going to try getting into meditation. Starting on Monday, he'll be doing a very strict silent retreat, for two whole weeks, and the process requires complete solitude. No phone calls, no texts, no visitors.
Of course they agree to respect Shane's space, though Yuna is skeptical. Shane has always liked to have time on his own to recharge his social batteries, but two whole weeks? Be real. Yuna gives it three, maybe four days before Shane realizes that a long-term stay at his cottage with no human contact— no company except for the thoughts in his head— is going to be the opposite of relaxing.
Yuna is apparently totally wrong, though. When Shane comes over for dinner a little over two weeks later— well, it really seems like it worked. She's shocked at how much it seems to have worked.
And it's not just that he's had a break. Of course Shane wasn't in the greatest mood, before. Pick a reason: the boredom, the lack of solitude, the lingering headaches, the tug-of-war between being in pain or taking the over-the-counter painkillers that always give Shane terrible heartburn. The lack of his usual regimented schedule, every routine out of whack from the macro to the micro. Missing time he usually would've spent visiting with the Pikes. He'd been texting Rose still, but she was stuck in reshoot hell and wouldn't be able to come visit until possibly Labor Day.
And then Hunter had kissed his boyfriend after Game Seven... and maybe Shane's sudden shift in mood was unrelated. Maybe it was just the disappointment as it slowly sank in that another team had taken a Cup that might have been his— and might have been his third before he turned thirty, if not for the assholes on the fucking Boston Raiders and their dirty hits. Maybe it was something else entirely. But that last week and a half at the house had seemed to add yet another layer of tension and distraction to Shane's already-unsettled mood.
After two weeks alone... well, to be honest, Yuna had expected him to show up grimly satisfied that he'd pushed through it, but relieved that it was over. Instead, Shane suddenly looks calmer and more well-rested than he has for years and years. Yuna is sincerely not sure if she's ever seen him this relaxed. He isn't just back to his old normal. He's almost a whole new Shane. Whatever kind of inner peace he's found, whatever mantra he's reciting— it's working. It makes him light and easy, makes him smile sweetly to himself when he thinks no one is looking in his direction.
"Well," David says, over dinner on Saturday night. "I have to say, we missed you, kid, but whatever you're doing, it really seems like it's good for you."
"Yeah," Shane says. "It was really nice. Just to have some time."
Yuna forces a smile, poking at her salad. When did she stop noticing that Shane was constantly tense? When did it start being normal— just how Shane always is? All of a sudden she's looking at a Shane who's somehow figured out how to get all that tension completely unwound, and it's really making her wonder. Before tonight, when was the last time she actually saw Shane really, truly at ease?
He had seemed to enjoy himself more than usual at this year's All-Stars game in Florida, but Yuna can't really see the common thread between an overscheduled weekend of events at a hotel in Tampa Bay and two weeks alone at his cottage. He'd said something back then about how he'd spent most of his free time hanging around the pool. Maybe the swimming helped?
She taps her fork against the edge of her plate, studying him. "I honestly thought you'd last three days," she admits. "Maybe four, if you were stubborn about it." It's not the kind of thing she'd have said to him two weeks ago, or at least not quite like that. She'd have worried about Shane taking it the wrong way, frowning or snapping, saying 'what do you mean, Mom?'
"I don't know. I mean, I didn't know either, if it was going to work like I hoped," Shane says softly. "But I thought, you know... if I don't give it a shot, then I guess I'll never find out, right?" He shrugs, smiling down at his plate. "So."
"What's that quote about mountains and waters?" David asks, turning to Yuna. "It's a Zen thing? From that leadership book you gave me for my birthday?"
"Oh, you know I don't ever actually read those— they're so boring!" Yuna says, and Shane chokes on a sudden laugh. "They are! They bore me to tears," she says, lowering her voice to make a silly confession out of it, hoping to keep the joke going. Hoping Shane will laugh again.
David chuckles at her instead, which is almost as good. "How do you always pick such good ones, then?"
"My secret witchery," Yuna says primly, then turns to Shane and whispers, "I just go along with whatever the Goodreads reviews recommend."
"Smart," Shane whispers back.
"All right, well. I'll look it up and text it to you, Shane," David tells him, and Shane grins.
"Thanks, Dad," he says. "I'd appreciate that."
Just before Shane heads back to Montreal, he comes by for one last family dinner. He still seems more settled than he was at the start of the summer, but a little more withdrawn; he smiles as they eat and chat, but he doesn't say much. Finally, as Yuna's just about to get up from her chair and start putting away the leftovers, he puts out a hand to stop her.
"Guys," he says, "I have something to tell you." There's something odd and serious in his tone that makes Yuna sit down and give him her full attention.
"Okay, Shane," David says, quietly encouraging.
"Okay, so this is—" Shane winces, staring down at his plate. "I was told this in confidence. But I thought you should know. Ilya Rozanov is going to sign with the Centaurs."
"What?" Honestly, Yuna's first thought is that this is a very bad joke. Surely Shane is trying to lighten the mood before he comes out with some news that's actually worse, right? "Mom, Dad, I failed my last random drug screen real bad, but on the bright side, Ilya Rozanov is staying the fuck out of Ottawa, so at least everything isn't completely terrible, right?"
But it's not a joke, apparently, because Shane just repeats himself flatly. "Rozanov is a free agent this season. He's going to sign with the Centaurs. It's already in the works."
"That's not... No. What...?" Yuna says, baffled. Ottawa can definitely afford him, and it even makes sense that they'd want him. But from Rozanov's perspective it's laughable. Career suicide. "Why on earth?"
Next to Yuna, David frowns and asks an even better question: "Wait a minute, Shane. How do you know?"
"He told me."
"He told you? Since when do you—" Yuna begins, and Shane actually interrupts her, which he almost never does.
"Listen. Listen, Mom. This whole dumb rivalry thing," Shane says, and sighs heavily, rolling his eyes. "I don't know, I guess Rozanov thinks it's funny but I always thought it was stupid. We don't hate each other. We never did, really," he announces firmly. "Like, sure, there were definitely times I wasn't his biggest fan, but it was never— it was never personal like that. The league and the press and the fans, they loved it, so— whatever, I didn't really care." He clears his throat. "But we actually had a pretty good talk at the All-Stars game when we played on the same line, and then he visited me in the hospital that time, and, you know. Like, since then," he says, and takes a weird, unsteady breath, "we talk. I mean, I guess we mostly text. We have a lot in common."
"Like what exactly?" Yuna demands incredulously.
"I mean, there's a few things, Yuna," David points out. "They were drafted the same year. They're both captains of Original Six teams. They've both led teams to the Cup—"
"Exactly!" Shane says, relieved. "Even Hayden and JJ don't get it sometimes, like— There are things it's just easier to talk about to someone who isn't on your team, you know? Someone with a different perspective."
Oh, no, Yuna thinks. "Shane. You're not talking to him about—"
"Of course not anything relevant to our competitiveness, come on, Mom! Obviously not stuff like that!"
"Okay, okay!" Yuna says, raising her hands, hoping desperately that her suspicions are wrong.
"So anyway," Shane continues. "He's a free agent. We discussed it. He wanted my opinion. And this— this is what he wants. So I really just wanted to let you know, Mom, it's fine with me. Really. You don't have to picket his house or hate the Cens now just because they signed him. I won't even be mad if you still want to root for them sometimes," he says, a seemingly honest smile tugging at one corner of his mouth. "It's fine."
It's fine?
Yuna doesn't think so. She doesn't know Rozanov, but she knows he's not stupid. Maybe pretending to be Shane's friend is exactly what he would do. If Shane makes one little mistake, hints at something he shouldn't— the possibility of a trade, the specifics of an injury, even another player's personal problems— that information could be so valuable to Boston. (And wouldn't Shane be even more likely to accidentally let something slip if he believed this silly story about Rozanov going to the Centaurs, who are, realistically, no competition to the Metros at all?)
"I guess then I'm back to... why?" she asks. "Why would Rozanov leave Boston? They drafted him! And for Ottawa?"
"Yes," Shane says, his smile vanishing. "I figured you would ask. And I do know why. But it's something he told me in confidence."
"Is there some problem in Boston? Is it the Raiders management? Are they—"
"When I said 'he told me in confidence' what part of that sounded like 'just keep guessing till you get it right?'" Shane says sharply.
Yuna falls silent, her mouth slightly open in shock. It happens sometimes— Shane gets worked up and says something snappish that he doesn't really mean. But he always hears himself. He realizes he was too harsh. He apologizes, and tries to explain what set him off. But that's... not happening. Shane's expression is stubborn, deadly serious, and not apologetic in the least.
Yuna looks at David. David gives her the slightest shrug that says: go on, but step carefully. Yuna raises her eyebrows at him: no thanks, you go on and step into the minefield, honey.
"Well," David says, "if you can't say, Shane, then I guess we won't ask."
Yuna gives her husband a brief, speaking look. That is not what she wanted him to say and he knows it.
"Thanks, Dad," Shane says. "And please don't go prying, okay, Mom?"
"Okay," Yuna says, and Shane gives her an equally speaking look. "Okay! I won't!"
"Okay," Shane says. "Thank you."
There's the slightest awkward silence, and then David says, "well, the drama at the Treasury this week is really nothing in comparison, I suppose," and goes on to talk about how apparently the whole office has been splitting into different warring factions based on whether or not they like the latest changes to the menu at the lunch café in their building lobby. Yuna heard this story last week and David knows that, of course, but she laughs softly in all the right places anyway, keeping things light and easy.
She tries not to stare at Shane.
"Bye Mom, bye Dad, love you," and the door closes behind Shane.
Yuna immediately whips her head around to stare at David. "Do you think he has a drug problem?"
"Shane?" David asks. Oh, ha ha, he thinks he's very funny.
"Obviously not Shane! No, Rozanov!" Yuna says, hands on her hips as she stands in the front room and watches Shane go down the steps in front of the house and climb into his car. That doesn't make sense, though. Shane probably wouldn't be so supportive of his new 'friend' if he thought Rozanov was destroying his career because of substance abuse. "Or... I don't know... a chronic injury that's going to start affecting his play?" His ribs had been badly bruised towards the end of last season, but what if that had masked some kind of subtler, long-term damage? "If he's never going to get back to a hundred percent, I could see it being an ego thing, leaving Boston. Does that make sense? If he can't be the best in Boston, at least he can be the best in Ottawa?"
"Hm," is all David says as he starts to stack up the dishes on the dining room table. "It might not be about hockey."
Yuna thinks about it for a while as she puts the leftover salad into a plastic tub and tucks it into the fridge. If it's nothing to do with hockey then it's personal. A scandal? "I wonder if he's knocked up a Canadian girl," Yuna says grimly. "An Ottawa girl."
"Oh. That's a leap," David says.
"All right, I'm just spit-balling here!" Yuna says. She keeps thinking about it as they clear the rest of the table and load the dishwasher together. She doesn't know much about the legalities of international custody agreements, especially between a Canadian mother and a Russian with an American work visa. She'll have to look into that. "Maybe he's got a kid in Ottawa and wants to be more involved?" She can only imagine what kind of woman would decide to have Ilya Rozanov's baby. Some party girl, high and drunk all the time, or maybe the kind of mercenary opportunist who wants to hook a pro athlete to support her luxury lifestyle. It could have happened any time in the last eight years. Rozanov came to America as a teenager, without any family to look after him as far as Yuna knows. That's an awful thought. She sets it aside. "But, well..." she says, thinking it through. "Maybe not. I don't know."
"Why not?"
"Would you leave the Raiders and move to Ottawa just to get shared custody of a kid that you'd really only get to spend time with in the off-season anyway?"
David thinks it over. "I probably would."
"You probably would," Yuna agrees, and leans over to give him a kiss on the cheek. David grins. "But you're not Rozanov."
"Maybe he fell in love," David suggests lightly, his hand caressing her waist. "Maybe he's getting serious about a nice Ottawa girl." Yuna scoffs in his face and David shrugs, moving past her and going into the kitchen. "It's certainly one reason to want Canadian citizenship!"
Yuna rolls her eyes, going back out to the dining room table with a damp cloth to wipe up any remaining crumbs. Oh, yes, she thinks as she makes the table shine again, that's exactly how Rozanov spends his nights in Ottawa, probably— having intimate candlelight dinners, going for long walks in the park. Getting serious, wanting to settle down with a nice Ottawa girl. And pigs will fly! "How many times a year does Boston play Ottawa?" she calls back into the kitchen. "Of course he's probably got a girl here, but how could it be serious?"
She's almost finished with the table when she hears the clink of wineglasses against the counter in the kitchen. Raising an eyebrow, she leaves the cloth and wipes her damp hand on her jeans. When she enters the kitchen, she sees that David has gotten a bottle of white wine out of the fridge, and Yuna's eyebrows go higher as he pours them two generous glasses. A glass of wine this early in the day is usually the prelude to a little afternoon delight. Yuna wasn't expecting it, and she more than half suspects that David is purposely trying to distract her from whatever is going on with Rozanov... but to be honest, she really doesn't mind.
They usually don't fool around like this in the off-season, not in the middle of the day. Not with Shane ten minutes down the road. There was a very close call years ago, when Shane was having the downstairs bathroom at the cottage redone and he'd popped by unannounced to get their opinion on some tile samples. Yuna's sweater was on inside-out the whole time. David only realized about five minutes into the conversation and came over, draping his arm over her shoulder and pulling her against his side as they perused eight slightly different shades of green. It was fine; some sweaters were like that on purpose, with exposed seams on the outside. And Shane didn't often notice things like that.
Somehow neither Yuna or David has ever found the exact right way to convey to their son, 'please call before you come over unannounced, as your parents are old, not dead.' But he did just leave, so... it's unlikely he'll be back again today. They're as safe from any kind of awkward incursion as they're going to get.
David hands her the glass, raises his in a silent toast. Yuna smiles at him, swaying closer, clinks her glass against his and drinks.
"Might not be a girl," David says, and walks out of the kitchen.
Yuna blinks, watching him go. David heads off through the dining room and crosses into the living room, circling around to the couch. She follows slowly, half-expecting him to get comfortable on the couch and pull her close so that they can snuggle and he can slide his hand up her shirt. But David doesn't sit down. He just stands there, staring at the lake through the glass patio doors. She comes closer. His thumb is rubbing against the bowl of the wineglass he's holding, back and forth. Back and forth.
"What do you mean?"
"Well," David says. "What if it's a boy?"
Yuna blinks. She takes a long slow sip of her wine and thinks about it.
After Scott Hunter came out in such a public way, it sparked endless low-level speculation about what other pro athletes might be hiding the same secret. It's invasive and unfortunate, and thank goodness it's died down quite a bit already, but for a while there it was the hottest topic going. Yuna kept a careful eye on the online chatter, braced for anything pertaining to Shane... but if his name was ever mentioned, it was usually only as part of a safely long list of "guys who just give me a gay vibe," never with any specifics attached. And, of course, there was always some superfan of Rose Landry who would happily jump in to insult the idiot who'd forgotten they were dating.
This thing with Rose... it's so confusing to Yuna. They haven't seen each other in person in months. Their Labor Day plans got cancelled due to some press event Rose had to attend, and Shane didn't seem that upset about it at all. But just because she and Shane don't seem to be in a rush to spend time together... just because he was so clearly relieved to not have to introduce her to Yuna and David... well, that doesn't necessarily mean it's not real. Does it?
Yuna can easily imagine that there are plenty of ambitious young women who would sign on to be a hockey player's public girlfriend in return for fifteen minutes of relatively minor fame— to get a boost to her Instagram follower count, a better class of brand affiliates for her YouTube channel. But Rose Landry? Notoriously allergic to party-line PR nonsense, a charming and astonishingly successful young woman who could have any man she wanted? Would she be in a fake relationship with Shane? Does that make any sense at all?
She doesn't know why she's thinking about Rose and Shane right now, anyway. The puzzle she needs to solve is Rozanov.
"There have never been any rumors about Rozanov and men," Yuna says slowly. "Exactly the opposite." Which is understating the case, really. Rozanov is absolutely notorious in hockey circles, and Yuna and David both know it. If the MLH held a vote among the players to determine the league's biggest pussy hound, Rozanov would probably have won it more times than he's won Most Punchable Face. "He likes to party. He likes girls."
"That's certainly his reputation," David says, but in a thoughtful tone that means he's wondering. Is there some reason Rozanov might want that reputation? How hard would a closeted Russian hockey player try to chase women, if he had to hide the fact that he actually liked men?
Because it would be very different for him than it has been for Scott Hunter. Hunter has had to deal with homophobes both blatant and slyly disingenuous, straight up slurs and threats and the concern trolls who just want to 'preserve team cohesion' and so on and so forth. But Rozanov— would he even be able to go home again, if people knew? If Rozanov got outed and the Raiders cut him loose with some shitty excuse about "distractions" or "public relations risk" and he lost his visa— it could be bad for him. Very bad.
Would the Raiders do that? Yuna is afraid she knows the answer. There's a big bastard of an enforcer, Ryan Price, who played for half a dozen different teams before he retired, never staying anywhere for longer than a season. His name, like Rozanov's, has also never shown up in the speculative forum threads about which athletes "just have a gay vibe." But. Well. Yuna is deep in a lot of hockey circles. She has connections, and she's heard things.
And Price played for Boston for a season. That was the year the Raiders won the Cup, actually. He wasn't one of their superstars like Rozanov, but he did well for them. Yuna would say he definitely made a major contribution to their winning season.
And they traded him anyway. And he's retired now. It's a shame, a real shame. And maybe it means that if Rozanov is gay, and if Boston found out... maybe he already knows what to expect. She sighs. "The Admirals seemed to handle Hunter coming out pretty well, all things considered. But if it was causing problems in the room for Rozanov, or if Boston even thought it might..."
David acknowledges her with a hum and takes a deep drink from his wineglass. He seems tense for some reason.
It's a good theory. The timeline fits, too. Yuna can easily imagine how Scott Hunter's grand gesture might have changed things for Rozanov. She imagines Rozanov's secret male lover in some expensive apartment, frowning and saying petulantly: Scott Hunter came out, why can't we tell people about us? Or maybe they just trusted the wrong person. Maybe they slipped up and got caught.
"I guess Ottawa does make sense in that case. And Boston wouldn't want to look like they're ditching a talent like Rozanov just because he's gay, so they'd do their best to keep his secret until the trade has gone through. The Cens get a star center at the top of his game, which they desperately need, and Rozanov gets a room with a better culture, and— well, the press is going to be fucking insane, and the Boston fans are going to want to string him up. But playing for the Cens gets him out of the spotlight, and Rozanov can keep his head down and work on getting citizenship while he keeps it on the down low with his nice Ottawa boy—"
Yuna says it very sarcastically, nice Ottawa boy, and then—
Oh.
Oh, suddenly it clicks, and her own voice seems to choke her, coiling in her throat. She turns, wide-eyed. "Oh, David!"
"Hm," David says, wincing a bit and nodding.
Yuna was just about to say the stupidest thing possible: If Rozanov is gay, do you think Shane knows? She was actually thinking: oh, that would explain a lot! If Shane is— and if he and Rozanov somehow realized that they share this common experience, then it would certainly help explain why they have a weird secret friendship that Shane never said anything about. If they—
If they shared the same secret—
"Not Rozanov," she says, feeling sick. "It can't be. Shane hates him."
"That's not what he said twenty minutes ago," David says, glancing back at the dining room table. "As I recall, he said pretty much the opposite."
"Oh my god," Yuna says. She puts her wine glass down on the coffee table and collapses back onto the couch, stunned. David is right. Shane waited until dinner was almost over, so he wouldn't have to stick around and get interrogated, and he delivered what was obviously a very well-rehearsed, very pointedly casual sales campaign pitch with an extremely clear tagline: I do not hate Ilya Rozanov. He is not so bad.
We talk. We text.
But what could you possibly talk about, Shane?
The unique kind of pressure we're both under. Things Hayden and JJ wouldn't understand—
"But," Yuna says helplessly. "Rozanov?"
David finally comes over to the couch and sits down next to her, setting his wine glass next to hers. It's late in the day, but the sun is still shining brightly over the lake. Yuna blinks away the sparkles and turns her head away.
David says nothing for a while, and then he reaches over and puts his arm around Yuna's waist and squeezes her against his side. "Honey, during Shane's... remember, during his silent meditation thing..."
"Yes?" Yuna says, a cold chill of dread creeping up the back of her neck.
"Well, one of those days, I couldn't find my phone charger, so I went over to the cottage. I told myself I'd be in and out." David hums, low in his throat, a familiar note of disturbance. "When I let myself in, I heard the shower going in Shane's room, so I called out to let him know it was me. He came storming out in just a towel, the shower still going. I thought he'd be annoyed, and he was, but... tense, too. Very tense. He grabbed the charger for me and practically herded me out the door. And I was halfway home before I realized..."
"Realized what?"
David sighs, reaching for his wineglass and taking another drink. "I'm pretty sure there were two coffee mugs on the counter by the sink. I went back and forth about that, but... yeah. Two. And you know how Shane is. Like you. Let cups pile up by the sink? Why don't we just go back to living in dirty caves! Anarchy!" he teases, and Yuna can't help but laugh. "But if he had a guest..."
"Why didn't you say anything?"
David exhales slowly. "Rose was in Montreal doing night shoots all that month, remember?"
"You thought he was cheating on her?" Yuna doesn't want to think that Shane would do something like that, but he's a young man, and he's only human.
"I don't know. We don't know they're exclusive. Maybe they're being modern about it, keeping things open. And I can see Shane not wanting to explain that to his old mom and dad..." David tilts his hand in the air, mouth slewing a little to one side. Yuna knows what he means: knowing Shane as well as he does, David doesn't think Shane would actively pursue multiple people at once— he hardly ever dates one person at a time! But he also doesn't want to believe that Shane would cheat on his girlfriend.
"Maybe they broke up and he just hasn't told us yet," Yuna says, but it's a weak argument and she knows it. "Maybe that's what the silent retreat was all about. Taking some time for himself to get over her."
"Except he wasn't by himself," David points out. "I don't think."
"Okay, all right, fine! Maybe it was some kind of rebound thing. There's no reason to think it was Rozanov." But it strikes Yuna that if Shane's guest had been a woman, then there would have been a pair of women's shoes on the shelf by the front door of the cottage. And David would absolutely have noticed that. On the other hand, just one more pair of size eleven men's sneakers, lying there in plain sight, side by side with Shane's boat shoes and Reeboks... Yuna's stomach is curdling.
"I suppose," David says. "But I keep thinking... they really seemed to connect, at the All-Stars game. If that's when they became friends, or even more than friends— that was just before Rozanov's father passed. When Shane took that bad hit, it was Rozanov's first game after he got back from Russia. And it shook him up, Yuna. You could see it. People said— oh, sportsmanship. Well, maybe. But with everything happening like that, one thing after the other... maybe they felt like the timing was right."
"For what? What, a summer fling?" Yuna hates how much sense this is starting to make. "They're rivals! Competitors! Their teams are rivals! How could they be so, so irresponsible? How could Shane—"
"Yuna," David says, leaning back into the couch and casting his eyes up to the ceiling, "when I met you, for almost a year you were dating, what was his name, that asshole Max, Maxwell Fournier."
"Fuck that guy," Yuna says automatically, though of course there's no real sting any more when she thinks back to her shitty sophomore year college boyfriend.
"Fuck that guy," David repeats, pleased. "And when he was stupid enough to lose you, everybody told me: don't fuck around! I knew I had to make a move before some other guy came along and snapped you up. I knew if that happened, I'd wake up at three in the morning and curse God for the rest of my life, thinking about how I blew it, missed my chance with that gorgeous, funny, smart Yuna Nakamura. Do you think I'd have felt differently about it if we'd also happened to be the captains of two rival hockey teams?"
Yuna is speechless. She has to stand up and pace. When she turns back towards David, she's honestly appalled that he would make a comparison like that, it's— it's not the same thing at all, it can't be. "Wait a minute, David! That was— You were serious about me! You were serious about me for a long time!"
"If I'm right, Shane invited Rozanov to the cottage. For two weeks. Has he ever invited anyone else out there?"
"Not that we know of," Yuna protests, but David just gives her a long, steady look. No, he's right. They'd have known. The only way Shane got away with it this summer was that silly lie about a silent meditation retreat.
"And for Rozanov to leave Boston, and sign with the Cens?" David presses on. "For what? Sneaking around during the season, a two-week fling every summer? It must be more serious than that."
"Why wouldn't Shane tell us?"
"Honey, he is telling us. He told us a little, just now." David pats the couch cushion next to him. Yuna doesn't move. "We're just going to have to wait till he's ready, for the rest of it."
"Well, I'm not ready! I'm not going to be ready!" Yuna isn't sure whether she wants to laugh or cry. "It's Ilya fucking Rozanov!"
"Yes, I imagine that's the reaction he's expecting."
"Because it's Rozanov! How can you be so calm?" Yuna cries. Since she won't sit down, David finally stands up and comes over, taking her hands in his.
"Shane's had a good summer, since those two weeks. Hasn't he?" David says, squeezing her hands. "Doesn't he seem different to you? I thought maybe it had to do with Scott Hunter. Maybe him coming out like that helped Shane feel easier about, well— whatever it is. But maybe it's also this thing with Rozanov."
"Whatever it is," Yuna says bitterly.
"Yes."
Yuna doesn't have any arguments left. She makes a helpless noise of protest, and then chokes down a sob that seems to come from nowhere. She hates when her emotions ambush her like this. She clenches her hands helplessly and David pulls her against his chest, and down to the couch, and half-into his lap. Yuna clutches him tight, and David doesn't say "Are you okay." He doesn't say "Calm down." He doesn't make promises like "It's going to be all right." He just holds her and rocks her, his hand tight in her hair just the way she needs it at moments like this. And Yuna wraps her arms around his waist and lays her head on his shoulder and hangs on.
They end up tangled together on the couch, Yuna's legs in David's lap, her head on his chest, the heel of his hand rubbing slow, deep stripes of sensation up and down her thigh.
Part of what's upsetting her is that she knows this whole thing is her fault. She thought she was such a good mom, so much better than her own parents, but no. She's fucked it up so badly that Shane is afraid to tell her the truth about himself and, relatedly, the famously messy rat he's hooking up with. Yuna tried so hard to be emotionally open, to be more accepting and understanding than her own mother. She was able to say out loud that she loved Shane, that she was proud of him. Despite what some people had thought, she had never pushed or forced Shane into hockey. She'd just supported him when he'd chosen his own path. And he'd chosen to pay the cost along the way, to endure every deprivation and make every sacrifice in order to achieve his dream.
Hadn't he?
Yuna sighs. Looking back now, she can see it. She can absolutely see it. Every time she pushed Shane to be less of his authentic, messy human self and be... something bigger and simpler and flatter, easier for the public to digest, easier for the brands to market. Shane, remember you're a role model. Think about your legacy. It's important to take it seriously, being a brand ambassador. No matter when it is or where you are, there will always be eyes on you. Think about your image, think about your obligations. Wear your Reeboks, wear your Rolex. Of course she'd never explicitly said: don't date men, don't be a gay man, but was Shane really so wrong, if he'd read that in between the lines of what she had said?
"It might not be what we think it is," she says, very quietly. "Maybe they're really just friends. Or even friends who— Friends who hook up. Shane would still want to help him get Canadian citizenship, wouldn't he? Even if it's not... serious serious."
David hums a doubtful little hum.
Yuna frowns and thinks about it so hard she can feel furrows in her forehead. That asshole Ilya Rozanov is going to give her a new forehead wrinkle. Oh, make it make sense! Can it really be possible that being closer to Shane means so much to Rozanov that he'd throw away any chance of ever winning the Cup again? And more than that! He must know that if he's outed, he loses any chance of ever returning to Russia. He would give up his birthplace, his home. His friends, his team. The city he's lived in for so long, the fans that clutched him to their collective heart, claiming him as their rock star, their misbehaving prince. And those same fans will inevitably turn on him like a pack of wild dogs when he betrays them for Ottawa.
For Shane.
"Or... they could be... together," she says, sounding it out, seeing how it lands. "They could be in love."
"It's possible," David says, and Yuna buries her head in his shoulder.
It's so sad. Shane should be coming to them grinning, excited, saying: Mom, Dad, I met someone, he makes me so happy, I want you to meet him. His name is— his name is Ilya. And instead he had to come and sit down and grit his teeth and pretend to grudgingly say, oh, it's whatever. Rozanov isn't so bad, I guess.
Honestly, she can't blame him. If Yuna were in her twenties again and she had to bring a man home to meet her parents— and if instead of a sweet, hard-working, quietly clever man like David, it was an infamous asshole bad boy party-boy pest like Ilya Rozanov? Of course she'd be doing exactly what Shane is doing right now. "Oh my god," she says, realizing. "It's a soft launch."
"What's a soft launch?"
"What Shane's doing!" Yuna says. "He's soft launching Rozanov! First: oh, Rozanov isn't so bad. We talk hockey. No big deal! Then once we get used to that, it'll be: actually, we're good friends. Really good friends. Close friends. After all," she says, and an uncontrollable laugh bubbles up out of her chest, "Rozanov is so supportive, isn't he? When Shane breaks up with Rose— he'll be so supportive!"
"I imagine so," David says dryly.
"And they'll start spending time together, once he's a Cen. They'll have reasons to explain it, if they meet up. Visiting the children's hospital together. Joint appearances at charity fundraisers."
"Sure, why not? Ottawa and Montreal aren't rivals."
"Exactly! And eventually we'll meet him, and he'll be on his best behavior. And by the time Shane finally tells us that he's— that they're— Well. I'm sure he's hoping that Rozanov will have cleaned up his image a bit, maybe even enough to make a good impression." She drops her head into her hands and chokes out the words through a fit of uncontrollable laughter. "And we'll like him fine, won't we? Shane's really good friend, his close confidante! Ottawa Centaur Ilya Rozanov!"
"What's so funny?" David says, putting his arm around Yuna's shoulders, pulling her close.
"Oh, David, don't you see it?" Yuna says, pressing the heels of her hands to her eyes, blotting her surging tears as the laughter finally subsides. "It's a good plan, a really good plan! And it's exactly how I'd tell him to do it!"