Archive of Our Own ^beta

"Great game, boys." Yuna greets Ilya and Shane at the door, pulling them each in for a warm hug. Ilya lets himself lean into her embrace a little, smiling when he releases her and David is right there with another hug. He's gotten used to the affection, mostly. At least he's stopped stiffening when David reaches for him, his instincts finally able to realize that this man doesn't know a touch that isn't gentle. He reaches down to unclip Anya's leash and watches as she trots happily into the house, no doubt on her way to the large bin of toys Shane's parents wasted no time in collecting.

"Thank you," Ilya replies. They played an afternoon game against Buffalo, coming out of it with a respectable 4-2 win. "It was good, even if Shane scored more goals than me."

Shane, predictably, rolls his eyes where he's hanging up their coats. "We're on the same team, you can't be mad about that anymore."

"Yes, but I am captain." Ilya gestures to himself. "Embarrassing for my husband to outscore me."

"You're so annoying," Shane replies, fond, knocking their shoulders together as he brushes past to greet his father.

"Be nice, Shane," Yuna scolds, earning a noise of indignation from Shane and a cheeky grin from Ilya.

"He started it!" Shane sputters.

Ilya shakes his head and shares a conspiratorial look with Yuna. "You see what I deal with."

Shane throws his hands up in exasperation and stalks towards the kitchen. "You're both annoying."

Ilya catches up and presses a kiss to Shane's cheek, enjoying the blush that spreads across his face even as he fights to keep himself from smiling. Ilya feels good, relaxed into this routine of a family dinner after a game. It surprised him a little at first how quickly Yuna and David seemed to accept him as part of Shane's life. Over the course of that first afternoon meeting, somewhere between standing awkwardly in their foyer and sitting down to eat pasta in the kitchen where Shane spent his childhood summers, they decided if Shane was all in on Ilya, they would be too. Once he moved to Ottawa, they only got closer, until it didn't feel strange at all to show up at their house without Shane, like Ilya was part of the family on his own standing outside of his connection to their son.

Ilya checks that Anya is settled and then joins the rest of the family in the kitchen, feeling his stomach grumble at the warm scents that greet him. David is moving around the kitchen, adjusting the temperature on the oven and stirring something on the stove, while Yuna sets out four wine glasses and fills three from a bottle Ilya remembers bringing over the last time he was here. The fourth she fills with ginger ale for Shane, who may have softened in other areas of his diet but still tries to avoid alcohol during the season. He smiles gratefully as she distributes the glasses, then leans into Ilya's side as Yuna holds up her glass in a toast.

"To the Centaurs making the playoffs," she says wryly, raising her eyebrows in Shane and Ilya's direction.

"The season's not even halfway done, Mom," Shane replies, exasperated, while Ilya just raises his own glass and sips.

Yuna and David exchange a look across the kitchen. "I know," Yuna says sagely. "And I'm always right about these things."

"Too bad you cannot use those betting apps they are always advertising," Ilya says, letting his free hand drop to loop around Shane's waist. "You would make millions."

David laughs as he pulls a tray from the oven and sets it on top of the stove. "She only uses her powers for saying I told you so."

Yuna raises an eyebrow as she slips past her husband to pull plates from a cabinet. "I am very good at that."

Ilya chuckles and lets his hand move lazily against Shane's side, enjoying the feeling of his husband next to him. They've been together all day, of course, but Shane is always tightly wound before a game, completely focused on his routine and what he needs to do on the ice. Ilya loves that version of him, but he also loves getting to leave the arena with him and watch him slowly relax as the adrenaline fades. Shane leans slightly closer and Ilya takes the opportunity to press a kiss to the side of his head, just because he can.

"Okay, everything is ready." David pulls the oven mitts off his hands and claps them together, gesturing to the plates Yuna set on the counter. "Help yourselves."

Ilya removes his arm from Shane's waist and hands off his wine glass, gesturing for him to go sit. He fills a plate for Shane first, scooping up a generous amount of brown rice and roasted vegetables before carefully selecting a piece of salmon. Yuna hands him a small bowl of sauce and he shoots her a grateful smile and nestles it to the side of the plate. He fills his own plate somewhat haphazardly then carries them both over to the table, delighting when Shane turns his head up for a kiss as Ilya sits beside him.

Predictably, Yuna launches into her recap of the game as soon as they're all seated, mostly pointing her comments towards Shane as he is the one to volley back. It's not that Ilya doesn't care or doesn't appreciate Yuna's insight, but he's never been one to linger on a game once it's been played. It was clear from the first time Ilya met Shane's parents that Yuna was the root of Shane's thorough devotion to all things hockey, and even though he's played at the same level as Shane for as many years he's not sure he could ever catch up with everything the two of them talk about. Though he does usually take Yuna's advice for things to improve in future games. The woman really is never wrong.

"Is Troy doing okay?" She directs the question at Ilya, and he shares a glance with Shane before looking back at her.

"Yes," he replies, brows furrowed slightly. "At least I think so."

"He was favoring his left side. His skating was uneven."

Ilya hadn't noticed anything different about Troy's skating, but then he supposes he wasn't really looking. He shrugs. "I don't know. He did not say anything."

When Yuna's attention is off him, he quickly takes his phone from his pocket and types out a text to Troy. Did you hurt your leg? When he puts his phone away, he catches sight of Shane pouring some of the sauce over his fish and fights the urge to outwardly smile, aware that nothing disrupts Shane's eating more than having attention called to it. Instead, he turns to David, deciding it's probably time to shift the conversation from hockey before they start going through every single game this season.

"Did you see my Wordle score today?" Ilya asks proudly. He'd texted it in the group chat, but then had to put his phone away for practice and more texts had come in after that he hadn't quite scrolled through. David had gotten him hooked on the game and he tried to play it most days, finding it a good way to learn miscellaneous English words he hadn't found in natural conversation yet. Though sometimes he was convinced everyone was making them up as a practical joke on people who were not native English speakers.

"It got it in five," David says, shaking his head. "I didn't realize how many words end in —ound."

"I know!" Ilya replies. "I got lucky and had W in my first guess. Then it was easier."

"Connections, though," Yuna chimes in. "That was diabolical."

Ilya shakes his head and scoffs. "I don't do Connections. Too many American pop culture references. And Shane is no help with those."

"Well, I'm not American."

"North American," Ilya amends. "And still, you are no help."

Shane shakes his head and eats another bite of fish covered in sauce, and Ilya hopes his smile passes as a reaction to the gentle teasing.

"My favorite Connections was the one that had you in the purple category," David says proudly.

Ilya looks between him and Shane. "What? When?"

Shane flushes, clearly pretending not to care. "It was a while ago," he mumbles.

"Athletes' last names starting with countries," Yuna recites. "Hollander, Benintendi, Malik, Maltais."

"I have been a crossword clue, like, four times," Ilya says, aware that this is a silly thing to get competitive about but enjoying the way Shane rolls his eyes and immediately volleys back.

"So have I."

"Yes, but probably in the mini," Ilya muses. "Less exciting."

Shane kicks him under the table. "Shut up."

"The Connections category should have been boring people who are boring." Ilya leans away from Shane's attempt to smack his shoulder, his lips split into a grin. "Or hockey players who need to work on their backhand. Pike could be in that one too."

Yuna laughs across the table, quickly hiding it in her wine when Shane turns a disbelieving look in her direction. "What?" she asks. "Hayden has let some things slide since you left."

Ilya laughs, momentarily distracted when his phone buzzes in his pocket. He pulls it out to read the text and huffs in amusement. Pulled my hamstring. It's nothing. As he reads, another text pops up. How did you know? Ilya almost wants to type back my mother-in-law is a witch, but worries it would be misinterpreted as something other than a compliment. Instead, he bypasses the question and tells Troy to get some rest, then turns his attention back to the table.

"Troy pulled his hamstring. Probably picked apples too strenuously. He says he'll be fine by tomorrow." He shovels another bite of vegetables in his mouth as Yuna looks pleased with herself.

The conversation floats along from there, the mention of Hayden sparking questions about how he and Jackie and the kids are doing, then moving to who on the Centaurs is expecting children, then gossip about who on the team might be dating someone new. Ilya thinks it's hilarious for him and Shane to be the ones gossiping about their teammates' relationships, considering none of them could likely ever produce a shock like the one Shane and Ilya had given the entire league, but it's fun to speculate about whether LaPointe's sudden upbeat attitude has anything to do with an indie film actress who was hanging around one of their post-game bars recently.

When the meal winds down, Yuna stands to start collecting dishes and Ilya immediately jumps to help, ignoring her protests. He takes everything to the kitchen and sets it down on the counter, hearing her footsteps right behind him.

"Go sit down, Ilya, you must be tired." She runs her hand across his shoulders as she passes behind him and Ilya leans into the touch, appreciating how easy the contact feels after years of going without that sort of parental affection.

"Eh, it was Buffalo," he says wryly. "I did not work too hard." He starts loading dishes into the dishwasher and checks to make sure Shane and David are deep in conversation in the next room, then leans to Yuna and lowers his voice. "He had most of the sauce."

Yuna smiles and squeezes his arm, then starts packing up the leftovers. They've talked before about their concerns that Shane's performance diet was hovering somewhere between athletic regimen and concerning restriction. And Shane has been getting better—ironically, since they were outed in a way that was completely out of their control, he seemed to decide it would be okay to give up some control in that aspect of his life—but the habits are deeply ingrained. So they all pay attention, give Shane choices, and quietly celebrate when it seems he is avoiding falling back into the more worrying patterns.

Ilya likes being on a team when it comes to Shane. For so long, he had no one to talk to about his confusing feelings for the boy in Montreal with the beautiful freckles and big brown eyes. When Shane left and started dating Rose, when he realized maybe his feelings for Shane were more than what someone should feel for a casual fuck, when Shane got hurt and he knew for certain his feelings were well past casual… He dealt with all of that by himself. It's nice to have other people around now. Not just Yuna and David, but his teammates. Harris. Svetlana, once he finally admitted to what she already knew about his mysterious friend Jane. He's spent the last few years building up a support system where he used to have none, and now he's not so sure how he let himself go so long pretending he didn't need it.

Now he has a team—a family, he corrects himself—people who care about him and Shane, as individuals and together. Yuna and David are Shane's family and somehow, miraculously, his too. It's not something he expected, facing them down that first afternoon in their cottage, prepared for whatever fallout may come from them discovering Ilya and Shane together. But the fallout was… Nothing. A few confused stares, some quiet processing, and then they were coming over for dinner and asking Ilya about his interests and treating him like they hadn't spent most of the last decade hating him.

He didn't know family could be so easy. His childhood was characterized by silence, a feeling of holding his breath and waiting for the other shoe to drop. Even when his mother was alive, the good moments they had always felt fleeting, stolen in those rare pockets of time when they could escape his father's shadow. Ilya never knew a kind word from his father that wasn't laced in criticism, roses with thorns sharp enough to draw blood, any compliment swiftly followed by a reprimand and reminder of all the ways Ilya wasn't good enough. He won gold, but he missed an easy shot. He scored a hat trick, but so did another player who was much weaker so it must have been a bad goalie and no skill of his own. He was first pick in the fucking NHL draft, but had a tendency to laziness.

Lazy, soft, weak. Words his father directed at his mother, then at him. Ilya knew what his father meant when he looked at Ilya with cold eyes and sneered you're just like her. Despite his father's best efforts, Ilya still believed it to be a compliment.

Meeting Shane's family confused him. Their words were kind, and even when they weren't it was with an air of humor, joking with each other the way Ilya did with Shane. He wondered if that was where Shane learned it. Ilya found himself studying the interactions, filing away information for himself. He studied David in particular. Shane's father was often quiet, but his quiet wasn't a means of exerting power or expressing silent judgment. He seemed to simply reserve his words for when they were needed, content to let his wife take the lead. His quiet was gentle, natural, somehow warm as he kept up with everything going on and jumped in with careful observations.

David wasn't all that physically affectionate with Shane, but Ilya started to wonder if that was more of a Shane thing. Because David was affectionate with Yuna, running his hand over her shoulders when he brought her a glass of wine, taking her hand when they sat on the couch together, letting her rest her head on his shoulder while a hockey game played on the television. With Shane, the touches seemed more rare, but no less gentle. A hug in greeting, a pat on the shoulder in passing, and—a few times—a ruffle of his hair that Shane pretended to squirm away from even as Ilya could see the pleased expression on his face.

And he was always so proud of Shane, and somehow by extension, Ilya too. He never held back his praise or his appreciation, whether it was a compliment about a hockey game or congratulating Ilya for finding a difficult puzzle piece (because Ilya is a puzzle person now). The first time Ilya got a gentle smile and a kind word from David, he'd felt it buzz against his skin like an itch he couldn't scratch. He didn't know what to do with it, so he just nodded and found an excuse to leave the room to give himself space to breathe. The approval Ilya sought so desperately from his father, rare and impossible, David gave away like he had unlimited reserves just waiting to be shared.

No one ever flinched when David walked into a room, or when he raised his hands. Ilya watched his hands cook meals for all of them, carefully sort through puzzle pieces, wipe dust off the framed photos of Shane at all stages of his life. Slowly, Ilya started to accept his affection too. Handshakes evolved to hugs, the feeling both strange and completely natural as Ilya let himself lean into it. He knew, without a doubt, that David was not the kind of man who needed to make others small to build himself up.

Yuna was less of a puzzle. Ilya had a foundation for what a mother was like, had spent twelve years of his life in the golden glow of unconditional love. Even when his father tried to dim it, tried to draw a wedge between them the way he did with Alexei, he could never make Ilya doubt his mother's love. Of course, Yuna wasn't exactly like his mother. There were times when she pushed when he knew his mother would have let things go, asserting herself in ways his mother's illness and reliance on his father prevented her from doing.

Yuna was different from Irina in many ways, but similar in the important ones. Her deep love for Shane, the fierceness of it that Ilya knows can sometimes feel overwhelming. The way she seems understand him better than anyone, to speak the secret language of Shane Hollander that now belongs to Ilya too. Her affection is unguarded and freely given, and Ilya can see so much of what he loves in Shane in her.

When the kitchen is mostly clean, Ilya hovers close to Yuna, searching for the right words. "I have not had the chance to thank you," he says quietly. "For the pelmeni." He and Shane had missed a day of practice last week to go to the cottage on the anniversary of his mother's death. It had been years since he intentionally acknowledged the day, and with the support of Shane and his therapist he managed to let himself sit in the complicated emotions that arose with it. The cottage was a place he knew his mother would love, and the time there had been good. He felt closer to her than ever, finally at home and at peace enough that the grief of her loss didn't feel as destructive as it used to. Yuna had made Russian dumplings to send with them when Shane told her what they were doing, the effort and care that went into them nestling somewhere warm inside Ilya's chest.

Yuna gives him a soft smile. "You're welcome." She wipes a cloth over the already spotless counter. "David and I tried a few recipes."

"They were perfect." There's a lump in Ilya's throat and he knows Yuna hears the strain in his voice, though she tactfully ignores it.

Yuna clears her throat. "Well, I can make them any time you'd like." She sets down the cloth she'd been using and steps closer, then pulls him in for a tight hug. Ilya leans into the touch, bending so his head rests on her shoulder. It's not the first time she's hugged him—not even the first time this visit—but it still feels novel every time, having gone so long without that sort of comfort. He pulls away but she doesn't let him go far, holding on his shoulders and waiting for him to look her in the eyes.

"I hope I'm not overstepping," Yuna begins, her voice achingly soft. "I didn't know your mother. But I know you, and I know being a mom, and I know she would be so proud of the man you have become."

Now Ilya can't hide the tears that spring to his eyes and he brings his hand up to wipe them away, almost embarrassed at the honest-to-God sniffle he lets out. He's trying to get better at letting himself feel his emotions, to not be embarrassed when the people he loves can see them too. He wipes his eyes and looks back at Yuna. "Thank you," he says thickly. "You two would have gotten along, I think. I wish you could meet her."

Yuna lets her hands slide down his arms and then steps back, just slightly, seeming to recognize that he's starting to get overwhelmed. "If you ever want to tell me about her…" Yuna tilts her head, her eyes soft. "I would love to get to know her."

Ilya nods slowly. "I will." He glances to the dining room, where he hears Shane and David starting to move. "Maybe another day." It's not that he doesn't want to talk about his mother now, or ever. But even this conversation has left him raw and a little fragile, and he wants to wait until he can speak without his voice breaking, when he can share his mother the way she deserves. He thinks Yuna gets this, and she reaches out to give his hand another squeeze as Shane appears in the doorway.

"Dad and I were going to take Anya out," Shane says, then stops, looking between Ilya and his mother. His face scrunches in concern, looking so adorable that Ilya wants to rush across the room to kiss him. "Everything okay?" He's already walking towards Ilya, drawn like a magnet, and Ilya feels himself melt.

"Great, moya lyubov." Ilya leans to kiss him on the cheek as soon as he's close enough. He can tell Shane wants to ask more and notices Yuna quietly slipping out of the room, no doubt giving them privacy. "I will come with you too. Anya needs protection from wolves."

Shane shakes his head as he laces his fingers with Ilya's and pulls him towards the living room. Their dog is sprawled on the floor, panting happily as David pets her stomach and Yuna looks on. As soon as she spots Shane and Ilya, she hops up and darts over to them, circling their legs like she knows what's coming. It all feels both simple and impossible that Ilya ended up here and he squeezes Shane's hand a little tighter, needing to do something with the love threatening to spill out of his chest. They get their coats on and David clips Anya's leash to her collar, ruffling her head again before leading them out the door.

Ilya keeps a firm grasp on Shane's hand as they walk to the end of the driveway and onto the street. It still sometimes feels like they're getting away with something when they walk like this, hand in hand and letting their shoulders bump together, unafraid to be seen. Anya darts excitedly ahead, stopping every now and then to sniff something and then looking back to make sure they're following. David talks about the neighbors, filling Shane in on the people he grew up next to, adding some context for Ilya as he explains whose children are off to college, who is moving out, who is putting additions on their houses.

He sometimes wonders what it would be like, to bring Shane to his childhood home. It's impossible, he knows, for many reasons. He has mostly come to terms with the fact that he will never set foot in Russia again. It's too big a risk, and he is well on his way to Canadian citizenship and severing the final tie he has to the place where he grew up. But it still comes to him, sometimes, imagining taking Shane to the places of his youth, walking through the streets he thinks he still knows like the back of his hand.

The house he grew up in, with his mother's garden outside. In his imagination the garden still blooms, though it never did again after she died. His bedroom, tidy and impersonal because his father couldn't stand clutter. The walk to his school, the rink where he learned to skate. The park he walked to that night he called Shane and unburdened himself, knowing Shane couldn't understand him but still feeling terrified to share so much, to lay his heart bare and hope it didn't shatter.

He wonders, sometimes, if there is a part of him Shane will never truly know until he's seen these pieces of Ilya's past. He feels like he's gotten to know Shane even more through spending time with his parents, in the house where he grew up, surrounded by warmth and love and framed photographs tracking every year of Shane's life. It's filled in some of the blanks, a puzzle coming together in front of him, and he loves Shane more and more with everything he learns.

Shane squeezes his hand and pulls him in to press a kiss to his cheek and Ilya turns to look at him. Shane quirks his eyebrows up, a silent question, and Ilya feels all his worries that there is some unknowable piece of him fade into nothing. Of course Shane knows him. Shane knows him because he has been there, because he has made it his mission to push past all of their hangups and fears to plant himself at Ilya's side. To open his heart to him, his family, his home, his life. And Ilya has given all of that back to him, has told Shane things he's never told anyone, has trusted him to hold Ilya's heart in his hands.

Ilya smiles and leans in to kiss him—more chaste than he wants to, because he dimly recognizes they are on a public street with Shane's dad walking right in front of them—then pulls away and keeps walking, holding tightly to Shane's hand. They catch up to David and Anya, her tail wagging as she sees them, and make their way back to the house. When they reach the driveway, Ilya takes in the warm glow from the windows spilling out onto the front porch, calling them home.