“You are hard to buy for.”
“I know. I love this, though. I’ll bring it to the cottage.”
Ilya stiffened slightly in his arms. “The cottage. Yes,” he said quietly.
Shane felt like he needed to explain why it might be risky to display photos like this one in his Montreal home, which was ridiculous. Of course Ilya knew the reasons. So instead, he kissed him, and it escalated as it usually did. They went up to the bedroom and had sex, but Shane still felt like they’d become dry kindling, waiting for the spark that would destroy them. Like there was something important that wasn’t being said, and they were both waiting for the other person to say it, but neither of them knew what it was.
* * *
Ilya spent most of Boxing Day working up the nerve to ask Shane a single question. Finally, early in the afternoon, he broached the subject.
“Bood is having a party tonight.”
Ilya said it casually, as if there were no particular reason he was letting Shane know. As if his stomach wasn’t a mess as he anticipated Shane’s reaction.
“Zane Boodram? He’s having a party on Boxing Day?”
“Yes. Not a big party. It will be chill. Mostly just the team and partners. Bood has fun parties.”
“Oh.”
Ilya held his breath.
“Did you want to go or something?” Shane asked, clearly confused. “I could stay here, I guess. Or head back to—”
“I want you to go too,” Ilya said. “I want you to come with me to the party.”
Shane twisted around so they were facing each other on Ilya’s couch. “You want me to go to a party with your teammates? Why?”
So they can fucking meet my boyfriend, Ilya wanted to scream. But instead, he kept his tone light and said, “They are cool people. You might have fun.”
“But...wouldn’t it be weird, if we showed up together?”
Ilya shrugged easily, as if this was a normal thing for him to suggest. “They know you would be in Ottawa for Christmas. We are friends, so I invite you to a party. No big deal.”
Shane’s face scrunched up in confusion, then he shook his head. “Too weird. I don’t think so.”
The dismissal, though expected, irritated Ilya. No, irritated was too small a word—it infuriated him. For a moment, Ilya didn’t react. He stared at Shane, stony-faced, while anger scorched through him like lava. Then, before he said anything he may regret, he stood up and walked out of the living room.
Shane caught up with him in the kitchen. “You can go,” he said. “It’s fine.”
“Great,” Ilya snapped.
“What’s wrong?” Shane sounded so genuinely clueless about why Ilya might want him to meet his friends that it only angered Ilya further.
“What isn’t wrong?”
“What does that mean?”
Ilya spun around to face him. “It means I have a boyfriend who doesn’t want anyone to know I am his boyfriend.”
Shane’s eyes widened in surprise. “Uh, sorry. Did I miss something? I thought we were on the same page about this.”
“We are not on the same anything.”
“I don’t fucking understand you.”
“Sorry,” Ilya said sardonically. “My English, you know.”
“That’s not what I—” Shane threw his hands up. “Could you please explain what the fuck is happening? Because last I checked we didn’t go to each other’s team parties. Or tell anyone about our relationship.”
“No. I don’t tell anyone about our relationship. You tell Hayden, and Jackie, and Rose, and your parents, and who the fuck knows who else.”
“That’s literally everyone! You know that.”
“It is five more people than I have told,” Ilya said, omitting his therapist, because that was a whole other conversation.
“What about...” Shane waved a hand around as he searched for a name. “Ryan Price?”
“Oh yes. My best friend Ryan Price. I have not talked to him since the last camp.”
“Well—” Shane didn’t seem to have anything to add to that.
“I have no one,” Ilya said. “No one I can talk to about us.”
“That’s not true. My parents love you.”
Ilya threw his head back and walked to the living room. Shane followed immediately.
“It’s not easy for me either, you know,” Shane said, clearly angry now. “We’re both hiding, and we’ve both made sacrifices that—”
Ilya spun around. “What sacrifices, Shane? What have you given up?”
“Seriously? If we get outed, our fucking careers might be over! Everything I care about—” Shane snapped his fingers “—gone.”
“Everything,” Ilya said flatly.
Shane rolled his eyes. “Not everything. But hockey is pretty fucking important to me.”
“No shit.”
“Oh, fuck you. Sorry I still want to win cups instead of smoking weed with my teammates between losses.”
The words hit Ilya like a crosscheck to the teeth. Shane truly didn’t understand anything. Not what Ilya had given up for him, certainly. Ilya could be in Boston right now, leading one of the top teams in the league to more Stanley Cups. He could be breaking more records, and winning more awards. Instead he’d chosen to come to Ottawa, when he could have gone to almost any team in the league. He’d chosen a team that hadn’t made the playoffs in over a decade. He’d chosen it because it was Shane’s hometown, and close to where Shane lived. He’d chosen it so he could build a life in Canada with the man he loved.
And Shane thought he had, what? Come to Ottawa so he wouldn’t have to work so hard? Ilya wanted to punch a wall.
“You wouldn’t even choose me, would you?” Ilya said. “If it is between me and hockey.”
“Of course I would,” Shane said, though not as confidently as Ilya would have liked.
Ilya studied his face, and saw Shane flinch. “Would you?”
Shane tilted his chin up defiantly. “Would you choose me?”
Ilya let the question hang in the air, his whole body trembling with rage. He couldn’t believe Shane would even ask that, after everything.
Finally, quietly, Ilya said, “You should go.”
“What? No way. Fuck that. Answer the question.”