Archive of Our Own ^beta

When Ilya’s phone lit up with an unknown number, he planned to ignore it. He usually did, because despite what people seemed to think, Ilya Rozanov was not an idiot. He knew precisely what the dangers of being famous were, and he took meticulous care to avoid all risks. If he wasn’t expecting a call or didn’t recognize the number, it went unanswered. Simple as that.

But then he saw the banner under the number that said Montreal Education, and to say he was intrigued would have been an understatement. 

Against his better judgment — and fully aware this was how people ended up regretting things — he answered. “Yeah?” 

There was a sharp breath on the other side, like they hadn’t expected anyone to answer, and the typical pit of dread began to form in Ilya’s gut. “Oh! Uh… hi! Hello, yes.” The person on the other line was a woman. Probably young, considering her stammering. “Is this Mr. Rozanov?” 

“Who’s calling?” Ilya asked. His accent had probably given him away already, but he knew better than to confirm. If this was a random fan, he wasn’t going to reward a lucky guess. That was why he had to change his last phone number. 

The woman on the phone took a deep breath, and he could hear the clack of keys on a keyboard. “I’m calling from Westmount Primary Academy.” 

Ilya knew that school.

It was where Jade and Ruby went — he’d seen the obnoxiously long name stamped across their folders at least a dozen times by now. He was pretty sure Shane had picked them up from there a few times.

The thought floated around in his head for about five seconds before he started to panic. Then he was on his feet and scrambling to the nearest closet for the first thing that passed as decent clothes. 

“Is everything okay?” he asked, and he thought—

No, he knew he was doing a terrible job of hiding his alarm. Thought was no longer involved at all.

“Yes! Yes,” the woman said quickly. “Well — no, but…” Okay, so she was also freaked out, it seemed. He didn’t know why else she would change her mind about whether or not there was a problem. “I’m sorry, I didn’t expect you to actually answer. I kind of thought the Pikes were playing a prank on me, because why would—” 

So, a hockey fan, then.

Made sense. It seemed like everyone in Montreal was a hockey fan. Ilya couldn’t even leave Shane’s apartment without someone recognizing him, and that was why he usually didn’t unless he was already here for a game. 

Ilya stopped in the middle of the hallway in Shane’s apartment and stared at his phone for a solid ten seconds. He watched as the call timer ticked up and up and up, and neither of them said anything. 

He was just confused at this point. Was there a problem or not? Why on earth was the school where Hayden Pike sent his children calling him? 

“Why do you call?” he eventually asked, when it became clear the woman wasn’t going to say anything else without being prompted. 

“Right! Sorry,” she apologized. Canadians had a thing with apologies, Ilya noticed. They were doing it all the time. Sometimes they apologized for breathing. It never got less weird. “I have Ruby in the nurse’s office. She has a fever and needs to go home.” 

Well, that made sense. That was, in fact, the only thing that had made sense since this call started.

Jade had a fever last week. Arthur the week before that. According to Hayden, every single one of them was going to get taken out at some point. That meant Shane would get it too. And, inevitably, Ilya. He’d already stocked both houses with enough orange juice to drown in.

“And you call me?” he asked. That part still didn’t make sense. 

“Yes. You’re, uh… you’re the last emergency contact on the list.” 

Emergency contact. 

Hayden Pike had put Ilya as his child’s emergency contact? 

Why would he do that? Was he stupid or just deeply, catastrophically dumb?

Not only was that fucking suspicious, but Ilya lived two hours away in Ottawa. If there was ever a more serious emergency, he wouldn’t get there in time to actually do anything. Why was his name even there?

“There is no one else?” he asked. This put him in a weird position. Either he pretended to be driving from Ottawa, and Ruby had to sit there with a fever for two hours, or he had to admit that he was in Montreal. There was no reason for Ilya to be in Montreal right now. At least, none that the public knew about. “You called everyone?” 

Jackie was out of town, and Hayden was at practice. It made sense that neither of them could go get her.

What didn’t make sense was Ilya being on the list at all. Let alone being the one actually getting the call. Surely there were other people. There had to be.

“Mother is out of town. Father isn’t answering his phone—” 

“He is at practice,” Ilya offered, though he was sure the woman already knew that. Especially if she already knew who Ilya was. People in Montreal knew Hayden Pike. They also knew Ilya Rozanov, which was exactly why this was dumb. 

“Yes! He is, and, um… Ruby’s Uncle Shane is also at practice. He and Mr. Pike are on the same team, as you know.” Yes, Ilya knew. That was why he was alone and bored out of his mind in Shane’s apartment. “You’re the fourth person on the list, but I saw that you live in Ottawa. I told Ruby that everyone was either unavailable or too far away, but… she insisted her Uncle Ilya was in town.” 

Uncle Ilya. 

Oh. 

That was why he was on the list. Because, for some godforsaken reason, Hayden Pike and Ilya Rozanov had become something like family. Because Ilya was an uncle to his children. He’d been Uncle Ilya for years now. Unfortunately. Fortunately. 

The woman cleared her throat and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Mr. Rozanov, I assure you I am very discreet. Anything you or Ruby say to me will not leave my office.” Ilya braced himself, but he already knew what was coming. “She said you came to visit Uncle Shane. She said she saw you yesterday. Are you still in town?” 

He took a deep breath through his nose. If Hayden had his phone on him, Ilya would be blowing it up. He was going to kill Hayden Pike, the absolute fucking dumbass. 

“I am five minutes away,” he admitted at long last through clenched teeth, and he didn’t miss the quiet gasp that came from the other line. Oh, god, this was going to be news. This was going straight to gossip blogs. It was going to get out. It always did. No amount of hats or sunglasses would hide the fact that Ilya Rozanov was about to pick up Hayden Pike’s child from school. “Tell Ruby I am on my way.” 

Three minutes later, Ilya was pulling his car out of the garage, and he already knew it would be spotted. The cars he drove weren’t very subtle — that was why they kept them hidden in the garage. Driving one to Ruby Pike’s school in the middle of the day meant there would be witnesses. He wasn’t getting away with it.

Ilya called three people on the way.

The first was Jackie, who didn’t answer. Unfortunately, she was on her way home today, and probably on a plane.

The second was to Hayden, who obviously did not answer. Ilya left a long, strongly worded voicemail that Shane was absolutely going to have to translate, because he wasn’t sure how much actually came out in English.

And the last call he made was to Yuna Hollander. 

Very little in life made Ilya Rozanov actually panic. The last time he remembered truly losing his composure was the moment he realized he couldn’t run away from his feelings for Shane. 

But Shane panicked. All the time. About everything. And usually it was Ilya who was calming him down, or more often than not, trying to prevent the things that made him panic in the first place. 

So, yes, Ilya called Yuna.

He didn’t know what else to do. He wasn’t sure how to handle this, and he didn’t know how to shield Shane from it. Because if he picked up Ruby and brought her back to the apartment, then Hayden would have to come get her — and that meant risking witnesses to Ilya Rozanov bringing Hayden Pike’s child back to Shane Hollander’s house.

He couldn’t exactly go to the Pikes’ house. He knew how to get there, sure, but he didn’t have a way in. He was lucky enough that he and Shane had car seats in the garage for when they had to babysit, and he definitely wasn’t going to be graced by a spare key showing up. 

There was always the option of taking Ruby to the rink, but that was almost worse. At the rink, Ilya had the excuse of only being there for Hayden, but it was more public. At the very least, it was swarming with Montreal’s team — and they all wanted Ilya’s head on a spike. If he showed up with Pike’s child, there were going to be explanations demanded. 

The only person in Ilya’s life who was better at damage control than Shane Hollander was Yuna Hollander. It was almost second nature when he clicked her contact. 

She picked up on the second ring, and Ilya didn’t even let her finish saying hello before he launched into an explanation of his problem. For the first time in years, Ilya felt truly panicked. Not for his own sake — he had been ready to come out of the closet flinging glitter for a while now — but because Shane was not ready. 

He spoke without breathing for the entirety of his five-minute drive. It wasn’t until he was parked outside the school that he realized he hadn’t actually listened to a single thing she’d said, and therefore didn’t know what the fuck to do with the child he was about to be responsible for. 

“Ilya, dear, you have to take a breath.” Yuna’s voice was calm but firm, and Ilya did as he was told like it was a play called to him on the ice. If there was one thing Yuna knew, it was how to deal with hockey players. More specifically, the one she’d raised, and the one she treated like her own. “Okay, you’re going to go get that little girl. Then, you’re going to text Shane and tell him what’s going on.” 

Immediately, Ilya started to panic again at the thought of telling Shane. “But he’s at practice! If he checks his phone, he will—” 

“Ilya, he’s an adult,” Yuna interrupted. It was fair — sometimes Ilya went so far out of his way to make things comfortable for Shane that he forgot he didn’t need to. “Tell him what’s happening, and he’ll deal with it. Call him, leave a message. Then, take that little girl to the store. Get her kids’ Tylenol, brothy soup, and coconut water. You can take her back to Shane’s until he or Hayden tells you otherwise. No one knows that’s Shane’s apartment.” 

Right. Of course.

Why would anyone know where Shane lived unless they knew Shane personally? He was private by nature, and if his address had ever leaked, he simply wouldn’t have lived there anymore. No one had to know the truth, even if they might have suspected it.

And all of that was if Shane and Hayden were even spotted in the first place. 

Ilya took another deep breath and stared at the school’s front entrance. Jesus, Pike. What did you get us into? 

“Thank you, Yuna,” he said softly. It had been so long since he had this — a mom to call with his problems. He had forgotten how nice it felt. Before he could second guess himself, he offered a mumbled, “Love you.” 

“Love you too,” she said. It was so casual, but he swore he could hear her smiling through the phone. “Go get Ruby, Mr. Emergency Contact.” 

Jesus Christ. 

Ilya had never been an emergency contact. Sveta joked it was because he was always the emergency, but that was only a way to distract him from the real reason. It had always been simpler — lonelier — than that.

The truth was, Ilya Rozanov had never been close enough to anyone that it required being written down. 

He knew he was on Shane’s list — down at the bottom after his parents and Pike — but that was really only because he wanted Ilya to be able to get information from hospitals. No jumping through hoops with Yuna and David, no arguments with hospital staff, no searching for loopholes when things got complicated. Between the summer camps and their shared history, they had a cover that made the paperwork easy enough to justify.

It felt entirely different to be the emergency contact for a child. A tiny, helpless human who needed a grown-up to come get them. And it was even more insane when he realized that meant there were parents who trusted him enough to take care of that child in their absence. 

Fleetingly, Ilya wondered if he and Shane were the couple designated to inherit the Pike children if anything ever happened to Hayden and Jackie. 

His mind was still reeling when he stepped into the front office. Immediately, he knew he was fucked. No less than five people stopped what they were doing and turned to stare at him. He could practically hear the questions cycling through their heads. 

What is Ilya Rozanov doing in Montreal? 

What is Ilya Rozanov doing at a school in Montreal? 

Is he even allowed to be here? 

None of it eased his nerves, and he had to shove his hands into the pocket of his hoodie to hide how much they were shaking. He clutched his driver's license in his fingers, though he doubted anyone actually needed to see it. They all knew exactly who he was. 

The man at the front desk was staring with his mouth open as Ilya walked up to him. The small Metros’ flag standing in the penholder made Ilya’s stomach drop. Not only someone who recognized him, but someone who knew hockey. That was an entirely different brand of recognition. 

Ilya cleared his throat, grateful he’d thrown on a gray hoodie instead of walking in wearing Shane’s Montreal T-shirt. “Hi, I am here to pick up Ruby Pike,” he said, trying his best to be normal and failing spectacularly at keeping his voice steady. 

The man stammered over his words for a moment, blinking like he thought it was a bad dream. “Are you sure that’s the right—?” 

“Yes. Sure,” Ilya cut him off. He gave a firm nod to make his point even clearer. He was very aware of what he was asking, and equally aware of how strange it was. “She is here, yes?” 

The man stammered again, and Ilya felt his patience thinning. Yes, he was Ilya Rozanov. Yes, he was in Montreal. Yes, he was here to pick up Hayden fucking Pike’s child — for reasons he was still struggling to wrap his head around.

“She’s—yes, she’s here, um…” The graying man finally turned to his computer, fingers tapping at the keyboard, and it was the first thing that didn’t make Ilya want to pull his own hair out. At least this seemed productive. “Are you—I’m sorry, just, are you sure that…” he trailed off again. 

“Uncle Ilya.” 

The small voice came from behind him, and Ilya didn’t need to think about his reaction to that. It was the same reaction he had every time he’d seen the girl since he met her. 

Ilya turned and crouched just enough to scoop her up. Ruby looked tired, and she wasn’t as excited to see him as she usually was. The moment he settled her against his chest, she pressed her forehead to the hollow between his neck and shoulder and closed her eyes.

She was warm, too warm, and he’d be lying if he said it didn’t scare him a little. He made a mental note to pick up a better thermometer than the ancient one he and Shane kept at the apartment. 

“Where’s Daddy?” she mumbled, already half asleep. 

There was a tightness pulling in his chest at the sound of her voice. She hadn’t been sick yesterday, as far as he had noticed, which meant she’d faded quickly. They needed to get medicine in her, and Ilya wasn’t entirely sure how he was going to make it through the store with a sleeping child. 

“At practice,” he answered, turning his head to press a kiss to her hair. She relaxed completely at the act of affection, as if that answer was enough. “We will wait for him at my house, okay?” 

She hummed, content, and pressed her face closer into Ilya’s neck. His grip tightened without thought.

Chances were, she would be asleep for most of it and wouldn’t remember, but he had learned a long time ago that the Pike children liked to know exactly what was happening. 

“Will Uncle Shane be there?” 

Ilya froze, his hand stalling on her back where he had been rubbing soothing circles. Until now, he had a pretty good argument for not being involved with Shane — except to whoever that woman on the phone was. Now, there was little he could do to deny it. 

He turned back to the man behind the desk, who was now staring at him like he’d grown a second head. “You are discreet, yes?” Ilya asked, glaring at the man like he was personally standing between his team and the Stanley Cup. Luckily, the intimidation still worked — even off the ice, even with a small child tucked against his chest. So, at the man’s hesitant nod, he turned back to Ruby. “Uncle Shane will come home with Daddy. You will see him then.”

The process of signing Ruby out was less tedious than Ilya had imagined. He had to sign two forms — one to officially say he’d been on campus, and one to actually sign her out — and then he was allowed to go. He didn’t worry about anyone wanting his signature for something nefarious. No one in Montreal wanted it — not even if they could sell it. He suspected they were supposed to check his ID, but no one asked. He was an easily recognizable public figure. At least this close to a rink. 

Getting Ruby into the car while she was half-asleep and clingy turned into a full ordeal. It took him a solid fifteen minutes to detach her from his neck long enough to guide her arms through the car-seat straps, and even then she whined the entire time.

When he finally shut her door and turned around, he could see a huddle of people with their phones pointed in his direction. Most days, that was normal. In normal situations, he didn’t panic over a camera or a whispering teenager. 

This was not a normal situation. 

As soon as he got in the car, he took his phone out and left Shane a message explaining what was going on. Then he sent the same explanation as a text, just to be safe. He considered sending a carrier pigeon too. It was better if Shane already had an explanation, because he was absolutely going to see it online.

Maybe Shane’s mentions weren’t blowing up yet, but Hayden’s definitely were. Not to mention that Shane had notifications set for whenever Ilya started trending. 

Ilya could see the headlines now: Hockey Star Ilya Rozanov Hides Secret Child in Montreal.

Or worse: Ilya Rozanov, Secret Lover of Hayden Pike’s Wife?

He shivered at the thought. Jackie deserved better than a headline like that. Also… she wasn’t Shane Hollander, so Ilya had no desire to be linked to her in such a way.

The store was no better. He walked around with a sleeping Ruby in one arm — her temperature creeping higher by the minute — and a shopping basket hooked in his free hand. For some reason, the store was a very popular destination in the middle of the day on a Tuesday. It felt like every time he turned into the next aisle, there were ten new people waiting to glare at him and reach for their phones. 

And they did glare — each and every one of them. He was an enemy in their territory. An invasive species that they needed to cut out. He felt as though he would have been jumped already if it weren’t for the child he was carrying. 

Still, every time he moved his arm to grab something from the shelf, he could feel people recording him. Every time he took a step, he swore he could hear a camera shutter. Each time he shifted Ruby to a more comfortable position, he could tell someone was second-guessing their own eyesight. 

Ilya Rozanov did not belong in Montreal. 

At least, not according to these people. These Metros fans. 

On another day, he would have been his normal, cocky self. He would have smirked at the camera, or winked at the women who gawked at him. He would have made some snotty remark that would end up going viral for all the wrong reasons. He would have teased or instigated or maybe even reminded everyone that Ottawa was taking the Cup this year.

None of that came out today. Suddenly, winning an argument with stupid Montreal fans seemed wildly unimportant. Not with Ruby clinging to him, falling in and out of sleep. Not when every few minutes there was a discontented Uncle Ilya whispered against his shoulder. Not today.

Today, there were better things to do than mock boring Montreal fans.

The cashier at the checkout was a middle-aged woman. Her nametag said Jenny, and she was the first person since he left the house to treat Ilya normally. Despite the fact that she definitely knew who he was, she didn’t stutter, didn’t gape, didn’t blink like he might disappear if she looked too hard.

“Poor girl looks exhausted,” Jenny said as she rang up the items. At the sound of her voice, Ruby tightened her grip around him. “I didn’t know you were a dad.” 

Ilya shook his head dismissively and handed over his credit card. “Am not,” he shrugged. He could already anticipate those headlines, and he didn’t want to encourage them. “Am — uh… emergency contact.” 

Jenny nodded with a silent oh as she took the card from him. But she asked no follow-up questions, and Ilya considered that a blessing. 

Unfortunately, the sharp ding of the till shattered whatever peace Ruby had found. She stirred immediately, lifting her head and blinking blearily. Her little frown of confusion nearly melted Ilya’s heart.

It was very cute. 

“Where’s Daddy?” she asked, still looking over her shoulder. She clung to Ilya a little harder when she realized they weren’t home yet. “Where’s Jade, Uncle Ilya?” 

He did his best to calm her nerves by running his hand through her hair. It didn’t do much, but he knew she was just tired enough for it to help — that was almost always how he and Shane got her to settle when they babysat at night. 

“Daddy is at practice, remember?” The gentle coax was enough to make her melt against his shoulder again. He rocked gently from side to side to encourage her to relax even more. Technically, that was something he only knew worked for babies, not older children, but he figured it was worth trying. To his relief, it seemed successful. “And Jade is still at school.” 

Jenny paused as she ripped the receipt off the machine, and for the first time she did look a little taken aback by his presence. “Wait… I thought I recognized her,” she said, gesturing towards Ruby. “Is that Pike’s kid?” 

Ilya sighed and grabbed the receipt before Jenny could hold it hostage. He really was going to kill Hayden for this. “Yes, it is.” 

He left before anyone could ask more questions. God forbid someone asked if he was kidnapping her. The internet probably already was. 

Getting Ruby back into the car seat was less of a hassle the second time around. Mostly because she’d knocked out on the way to the car and was dead weight by the time he was maneuvering her arms through the straps. It was a small mercy, but he found himself deeply grateful it hadn’t turned into another twenty-minute struggle.

However, getting Ruby out of the car when she was dead weight was decidedly much harder. For a brief moment, Ilya considered just slinging her over his shoulder and carrying her inside. Upon further reflection, he decided that would look terrible if anyone saw it.

In the end, he shook her gently awake so she could hang on to him on the way up to the apartment. She was back asleep by the time they walked through the door. 

He set her on the couch, then panicked about the possibility of her rolling off of it. For the life of him, he couldn’t remember whether it was Ruby or Jade who tossed in their sleep, only that it was definitely one of them.

Pillows everywhere.

Four of them were laid on the floor just in case, and for the first time in his life, Ilya considered thanking Shane for his ridiculous obsession with squishy decorative cushions. 

When he was confident with his cushioning, he drifted into the kitchen. The amount of care he took to not make noise was honestly a little ridiculous. Part of him wondered what it would look like from the outside — a large hockey player tiptoeing around the kitchen so the pans didn’t clang together. He had to laugh at himself. 

The soup heated slowly, and he made sure to stir it almost too often so that none of the noodles stuck to the bottom of the pan. He knew he wouldn’t have time to clean it before Shane got home, and the thought of being lectured about a “ruined” pot sounded like a nightmare after an already unbearable day. 

Despite knowing sugar wasn’t great for sick kids, he added a spoonful of sweetener to Ruby’s coconut water. He could get her to drink just about anything if it was sweet enough — the Great Prune Juice Debacle taught him that — and he already knew the Tylenol was going to be war. Ilya was a stubborn person, but he paled in comparison to Ruby Pike. 

He even cut up half of a banana for her. It was her favorite, and he hoped it would convince her to take the medicine if he said she couldn’t have it until after. It was a weak plan, and bribery was obviously a bad thing to teach to children — but he was her uncle, not her dad. He didn’t have to parent her. 

That was a dangerous thought.

Parent.

If he closed his eyes, he could picture it with clarity that almost burned — this exact scene, but with a child of his own. A child he shared with Shane. It was dangerous because he wanted it so badly, and it wasn’t happening anytime soon. 

They weren’t coming out until they retired. They had agreed. It sucked, but it was the easiest course of action. Ottawa would have been fine with it, but the rest of the league was another story. It felt like Ottawa was the place players got dumped after they hinted at their queerness. And Montreal was… fine. Good. But they weren’t Ottawa.

So retirement. They would come out at retirement. Which was probably a decade away. And after that… would they even want kids at that point? With knees that creaked and shoulder joints that had taken too many hits to count? Would they even have the energy for children then? 

And they wouldn’t even be married until retirement. Was there a minimum number of years they needed to be married before they could adopt? What if they had to wait thirteen years from now instead of ten? Or would they get special permission given the fact they would have been a couple for twenty years at that point? 

Holy shit. 

They were going to have been together for twenty years before they could even consider children.

Dangerous. Those thoughts were dangerous. So, Ilya absolutely did not think about what it would be like if Ruby Pike was actually his and Shane’s. He didn’t think about making soup from scratch the second their kid started sniffling. He definitely didn’t imagine murmuring Russian to a feverish child curled up in his lap.

He didn’t. 

He placed the bowl of soup and the half-banana on a tray and then brought it out to the living room. Ruby was still passed out on the couch in the same position he’d left her in, so it must have been Jade who tossed in her sleep.

Or maybe it was neither of them…

Maybe it was Arthur. 

Ruby whined when he shook her awake. That was expected, not only because she was a child, but because she was the single most vocal person that Ilya had ever met. If she ever played hockey, she’d be an elite chirper. No doubt about it.

In the end, the only way he got her to eat was by settling her on his lap and putting on her favorite movie. She was obsessed with The Aristocats. Ilya didn’t really understand it — the movie was old, hadn’t aged particularly well, and lacked any significant dogs — but it worked. So he let it play on a loop and focused on feeding her.

And then came the Tylenol conversation. 

“Can I have the banana?” Ruby asked. Her eyes were half-closed in exhaustion despite the fact that she’d been sleeping most of the day, and her fists were clenched onto Ilya’s sweater like she thought he was going to disappear. 

He hummed in agreement, but reached for the medicine instead. “After this.”

It took all of four seconds before his hand was swatted away from her mouth. 

They went back and forth for longer than Ilya cared to admit. If anyone knew he spent the better part of the afternoon arguing with his niece about Tylenol, he thought his reputation would take a critical hit. Part of him wished it was Arthur he had to pick up — that kid was the most well-behaved, mild-mannered child to ever exist. Or maybe Amber, who could barely speak at all.

As it turned out, he wasn’t using enough bribery. The second he sweetened the deal, she was willing to negotiate. 

“If you take the medicine, I’ll put chocolate sauce on your banana.” He had a secret bottle stashed in the very back of the fridge. He was sure Shane had found it by now, and was similarly convinced he was pretending not to notice it every time he opened the fridge. It had been there for months, and they both knew chocolate sauce didn’t belong anywhere near the macrobiotic diet. “As long as you never tell Uncle Shane.” 

Ruby narrowed her eyes — which shouldn’t have been as cute as it was, considering she was draining him for all he was worth. “Hot fudge,” she countered. 

Ilya had a sudden, vivid realization that he had taught her far too well how to argue. He had created a monster. It had started as a way to annoy Hayden, and somehow that had felt productive at the time. It was significantly less funny when it was being used against him.

And okay, look… 

Yes, Ilya had a jar of hot fudge in the fridge too. And Ruby only knew about it because Jackie Pike had been the one to sneak it into the house. Not that he would ever tell Shane, but there was a lot of junk food hidden around this apartment. Chips, cookies, and yes, hot fudge. 

Surely Shane knew about it. The two of them didn’t hide much from each other, based on the simple principle that neither of them could. Spending nearly a decade pretending not to know someone in the most intimate ways possible had, ironically, made them very good at reading each other.

Shane knew about the junk food. He’d known for a long, long time. He didn’t say anything about it because it was much easier for both of their pride to not argue about it.

Shane pretended not to notice, and Ilya pretended it was sustainable. Ilya got to keep his food, and Shane didn’t have to face the reason he didn’t want it around. And when they were finally able to face it, they’d argue for a day and agree it was resolved. 

They had done this ten times in the last year.

The junk food always came back. 

And Ruby Pike was about to become argument number eleven unless Ilya gave in to her ridiculous demands for a banana split minus ice cream. 

For a moment — a longer moment than Ilya wanted to admit to, given she was a child — the two of them just stared at each other. It wasn’t the worst idea to give her hot fudge. Not if it meant she took her medicine. 

“Fine,” he agreed. He watched the light flicker back into Ruby’s eyes, and while he was giving in, she was much too happy about his misery. “But only if we can watch 101 Dalmatians next.” 

Ruby pretended to think it over, lips pursed the exact same way Hayden’s did when he was over-analyzing a play. Then she nodded once. “Deal.” 

And that was it. She reached out and grabbed the small cup of medicine from Ilya’s hand and swallowed it down with a grimace. After he confirmed — by making her open her mouth and stick her tongue out — he handed her the coconut water and went to dig out the hot fudge from the fridge. 

After forty-five seconds in the microwave, he drizzled the hot fudge over the banana and accepted the fact that he’d lost his dignity as he watched her eat it. The Great Ilya Rozanov had just lost a face-off to a child. 

When she was done with her banana concoction, he sent her to clean her face in the bathroom while he tried to wash the evidence off her plate. It was the only dish he was going to have time to wash, but it felt like a worthy cause. Shane would never let him hear the end of it if he found out Ilya had given chocolate to a sick child. And Hayden—

Jesus Christ, Hayden would have used it just as an excuse to argue with him. The two of them were friends (unfortunately), but that didn’t mean they didn’t argue. In fact, Ilya was sure arguments were their love language at this point. Maybe that was why no one ever noticed the fact that they were friendly at all. 

Ilya had just pressed play on the dog-centered Disney movie when Ruby padded her way back into the room. The medicine had finally kicked in — he could tell by the way she rubbed at her eyes and wobbled across the floor like a tiny drunk.

Tired. She was tired. 

“Uncle Ilya, can I lay with you?” she mumbled. Only half of her words managed to make it out fully, but he’d grown used to her sleepy murmurs. 

He smiled softly and opened his arms for her to crawl into. When her head landed on his chest, it didn’t seem so strange that he was her emergency contact. It felt obvious. She felt safe here. Of course she did. She’d never known any different.

That ache settled in his chest, heavy and unfamiliar. He didn’t know what to do with it.

He had known, of course, that Pike’s children loved him — that they knew he loved them just as much. He had understood for a long time that they didn’t see him as just Uncle Shane’s partner. 

Still, it was a strange, weighty feeling to know that even when Shane wasn’t around, Ruby Pike knew she could fall asleep on Ilya’s chest without fear. She didn’t wonder where she’d wake up or who would be there. She just knew. She knew she’d wake up still held by Uncle Ilya.

He’d never had that. Not past a certain age. Maybe not ever. His mother had been safe, in her own way, but it had always been hard. As far as Ilya was concerned, the first person he’d ever felt truly safe falling asleep with was Shane Hollander.

For a long time, Ilya wasn’t sure he deserved to have kids. Wanted them, sure. Absolutely. He had always known he wanted kids. 

He didn’t know if he should. 

And then Ilya met the Pike kids, and those worries melted every time they hugged him. Now that he was holding Ruby in his arms, as he felt her doze off and settle, it was like he’d never had any doubts at all. 

The movie was halfway over before Shane and Hayden finally answered his texts. Both of them were worried about how Ruby was doing, but neither of them — neither of them — had been worried at all about who was taking care of her. There were no questions about what Ilya had done to help her or if he knew what he was doing. They only wanted to know how high her fever was, whether or not she was resting, if she’d eaten anything.

When the door of the apartment opened, Ilya didn’t even move. Ruby was still asleep, and he had no intention of waking her. He could physically feel her fever going down with every minute of sleep, and disturbing that now just felt cruel. 

“How’s she doing?” Hayden asked, kneeling in front of the couch. His voice stayed soft as he brushed a hand over her forehead, but he didn’t try to pry her from Ilya’s arms just yet. 

Because he trusted Ilya with her. So much so that he’d put it in stupid fucking writing at the stupid fucking school. 

Ilya shrugged as much as he could with Ruby curled against him and rubbed slow circles into her back. “Better now,” he answered. “She took Tylenol almost two hours ago. Seems to help.” 

Waking Ruby up was harder than getting her to take the medicine. Each time she stirred, she only wrapped her arms tighter around Ilya and hid her face from the light. Tiny drunk, he thought again, fonder than anyone outside of this room — minus the Hollanders — would give him credit for even knowing how to do. It seemed she didn’t even know who was trying to wake her up, because if she did, they all knew she would have gone straight to Hayden. 

It must have taken fifteen minutes before she finally opened her eyes and mumbled, “Daddy?” with equal parts confusion and relief. 

Hayden wrapped her tightly in his arms when she finally went to him, pressing kisses to the side of her face and cradling the back of her head. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to pick you up,” he whispered. His face was all screwed up like he might cry, and it was somewhat of a shock for Ilya to realize that Hayden didn’t look panicked — he looked guilty. Angry at himself that he hadn’t been there sooner. “I’m going to stay with you all day tomorrow. I promise.” 

“‘S’okay. Uncle Ilya made me soup.” Her words slurred together as she slept, arms wrapped around her dad like a koala. “Put pillows down like he does for Arthur.” 

Arthur! It was Arthur that tossed in his sleep. 

Hayden mouthed ‘thank you’ as he left. Later, Ilya got a text about grabbing dinner the next time they all had a night off — Hayden’s treat — followed by a long message thanking him for taking such good care of Ruby. Jackie texted too, promising to send flowers, which Ilya found equal parts sweet and completely deranged.

They didn’t owe him anything. He took care of his niece. He would do it again in a heartbeat. For Ruby, for Arthur, for any of the Pike kids. They were family, after all. 

But it was Shane who held his attention for most of that evening. He had almost immediately laid himself on top of Ilya, occupying the empty space that Ruby had left. Neither of them could deny, even this early in the afternoon, that they were both exhausted. 

“You’re good with her,” Shane whispered, pressing a kiss right over Ilya’s heart. 

He didn’t know what made him say it — maybe the whole day with Ruby, or maybe just the fact that he was half-asleep on the couch with Shane’s weight pressing down on him — but Ilya couldn’t hold his tongue. “I want babies,” he said. 

Shane almost immediately tensed. Ilya could feel it under his fingertips where they pressed into Shane’s side, and for a second he regretted every decision he’d ever made. Way to ruin a good thing. All it took was one sentence, and suddenly he had Shane spiraling again. 

But then Shane relaxed, pressed another kiss to his chest, and let out a long sigh. “I want them too,” he replied. “Want them with you.” 

Ilya could have sworn every nerve in his body relaxed and caught fire in the same breath. Shane wanted kids. Shane wanted kids with him. Nothing in the universe compared to how amazing that felt. Not one thing. 

However, deep in his soul, Ilya was a shit-stirrer and nothing more. “What are people saying online?” he asked. 

Curiosity. That’s all it was. He hadn’t had time to check his phone in hours, but he just knew someone had posted something. What had happened that day had been mildly public, and entirely confusing to anyone who wasn’t Shane Hollander or Hayden Pike. 

Shane groaned loudly, which only made Ilya laugh. At that point, Shane didn’t even need to tell him. He could picture the Twitter threads already — fifty bullet points about when he and Hayden had interacted; essays about how close he might have been to Jackie; grainy photos from public events where he and the Pikes had existed within the same ten-foot radius. The internet never missed an opportunity to be very wrong, very loudly.

And they both knew that Shane would get mentioned in those threads, but not for the reasons that mattered. It was much more interesting to speculate what was going on with Ilya and Hayden right now. The thing with Shane was on the back burner for Twitter stalkers, at least for a while. 

They figured it would die down in a few days. 

It didn’t. 

Not only were their teams asking questions in group chats and the locker room, but reporters had started reaching out as well. Hazy even forwarded Ilya an email from some second-rate columnist who apparently thought he could get an inside scoop from someone who had never once spoken to Hayden Pike off the ice. Witnesses from that day began popping up everywhere. Ilya was fairly certain that at least half of them were lying.

Then someone claimed they saw him and Ruby go to Shane Hollander’s house.

That tweet had stopped Ilya dead in his tracks, fear creeping up his spine. Then he read it a second time and realized this person claimed Shane lived on the opposite side of the city. They hadn’t seen a damn thing and certainly didn’t know the nature of his and Shane’s relationship.

Even in the replies, most people seemed to agree this person was full of shit.

The first week was weird, the second week irritating, and the third week turned into torture. It felt like neither Ilya nor the Pikes could go anywhere without someone asking about the pictures of Ilya walking around a supermarket with a sleeping Ruby. 

The boiling point came when the Pike children started being asked questions about Ilya. Mostly from other kids at school parroting their nosy parents, but sometimes a faculty member for their after-school care, or just a stranger who should have known better.

That was the line. Keep the kids out of it was an unspoken and well-respected rule in hockey, and crossing that line wasn’t just rude — it meant war. 

Just shy of a month after the incident, Hayden Pike had to put out an official statement about what had happened. Which, after a day of intense shock, was objectively hilarious for almost anyone who knew Hayden or Ilya. 

Mostly because, for the statement to hold any weight at all (and for Hayden to not get accused of letting Ilya cuck him) he had to publicly claim the two of them were friends. Good friends. Some might even say best friends. 

The statement was suspiciously similar to the one Ilya and Shane kept tucked away in their In Case of Emergency folder, which made Ilya fairly certain Yuna Hollander had been involved. It was also regrettably, annoyingly, very good. There was no universe in which Hayden had written it alone. 

The statement was simple, vague when it needed to be and direct in its purpose. Now, officially, Hayden and Ilya had been good friends off the ice for many years. They got teased to hell and back by their respective teammates for that one. 

As for why Ilya was the person to pick up his sick child from school, Hayden’s official excuse was that, with a lack of blood relatives nearby, it made logical sense to put their good friend Ilya Rozanov on the list. In case of dire emergencies where everyone else was otherwise unavailable.

Which wasn’t technically a lie.

Actually, it wasn’t a lie at all. 

The last part of the statement read less like reassurance and more like a warning. That was the part of the statement Ilya had screen-shotted and reposted on all of his socials, because a repost of the whole statement didn’t feel strong enough.

Anyone else who asked the Pike kids anything about their Uncle Ilya would be handed a lawsuit. 

Because sometimes hockey players hated each other, and sometimes the press became loud and ugly, but they kept the kids out of it.