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Shane’s walking out of the locker room before he remembers to check his phone. He’s got a missed call from his dad, a text from Jackie about dinner next week, a few instagram messages from Ilya. He must still be in the air, relying on shitty in-flight wifi. Sometimes he spends entire plane rides just narrating his journey, whether Shane responds or not. It’s cute. Shane always wants to hear about Ilya’s day, and a boring flight is no exception. He will gladly read through forty five texts categorizing the difference in Bood’s snores.
Boring is safe. Boring is pure contentment. The kind of domesticity he never thought they’d get to have.
He swipes up without thinking, scanning over the messages. Then he stops. Reads them again, just to make sure he understands.
They’re—romantic for sure, but mostly they’re weird. Intense in the way that begs for absolution, like a death-bed confession.
An icy dread pools in the pit of Shane’s stomach. He pulls up Ilya’s contact with fumbling fingers, presses the phone to his ear and waits.
Hi, this is Ilya. I will never listen to your voicemail.
Shane jolts like he’s been shot, a sharp breath bursting from the depths of his diaphragm. The comfort of hearing Ilya’s voice fizzles out with the knowledge that Ilya didn’t pick up. Logic says he’s still on the flight. But why would he—
Ilya knows how Shane is, how he gets. He wouldn’t send a bunch of ominous fucking messages and then drop off the face of the earth without letting Shane know he’s okay.
Except, he did. Which means—
Shane blows out a breath. The center of his chest feels numb and it’s spreading, pins and needles down his arms and across his shoulders. To Ilya’s voicemail, he says, “Call me when you get this, okay? And I mean as soon as you get this. I love you.” He ends the call and tries again.
Hi, this is Ilya. I will never listen to your voicemail.
Shane hangs up. Tries again, and again, and again.
Hi, this is Ilya. I will never listen to your voicemail.
Hi, this is Ilya. I will never listen to your voicemail.
Hi, this is Ilya. I will never—
His phone drops to the floor with a clatter. He doesn’t remember letting go of it, but he must have. It’s like wading through water trying to pick it back up. The world is moving so slowly.
Down the hallway, someone gasps. A cluster of staff members are crowded beneath one of the flat screens, murmuring to each other. The image of a plane on fire fills the screen, but Shane isn’t close enough to read the headline. He doesn’t know where his glasses are.
In a single moment, he’s beneath the television, too. He…moved, he thinks he did, he must have—
“—flight AA218 to Tampa, Florida, believed to be transporting the entirety of the Ottawa Centaurs—”
Certainty settles over Shane like a fine layering of dust. Ilya is on that plane. Ilya will never listen to his voicemail. Ilya will not be calling him back as soon as he gets it, because Ilya will be dead.
“—Shane, hey, what—oh fuck.”
Shane is turned around. Hayden stands in front of him, hands steady on his shoulders, face impossibly pale.
“Hayd,” Shane whispers, eyes drifting back towards the screen. “Hayd, he’s—”
“I know,” Hayden hushes, looking pained, “Hey, buddy, I know, I’m sorry, let’s get you—”
Shane is being moved. Pulled into a side room, some random office. The door shuts with a resounding click. Shane flinches, because it’s too loud, everything is too loud, the people in the hallway and Hayden’s voice and his own ragged breathing—
He thinks Hayden is trying to talk to him, feels his hands passing over Shane’s body like he’s checking for injuries, or maybe like he can hold together all the parts of Shane that are currently falling to pieces.
I love you. Always. Maybe since the first time I saw you.
In his mind, he sees Ilya. He sees the boy he was, superimposed over the man he’s become; curls peaking out from beneath a beanie, eyebrows furrowed and mean. The curling smoke, the harsh twist of his lips. “He’s kind of a dick,” he’d told his parents, and he’d meant it. He still does. Ilya is kind of a dick. It’s just that he’s also the love of Shane’s life.
I am thinking of only you right now. A million memories. Thank you for those.
A million memories, all of them secret. Shane used to think that meant safe. Protected from the world and the cruelty that would surely overshadow everything else. Now, he thinks—he thinks private is starting to sound a lot more like ashamed, when Ilya deserves to be loved loudly, on purpose. He deserves a fucking marching band of love, following him around everywhere and announcing to the world how kind and lovely and perfect he is.
And Shane can’t even give him a dinner with his team.
Whatever happens, I am with you. Safe in your heart. I believe it.
Except he isn’t safe, is he? He’s hurtling towards the ground in a fiery fucking death trap, thousands of miles away. Shane will never see him again. Not alive.
Will he even be called to identify Ilya’s body? Will anyone reach out to notify him? Is he—
“Shane, Shane.” Hayden jostles him gently, tilting his phone so Shane can see. He can’t, because he’s crying, and also his glasses are—somewhere, but Hayden tells him what it says anyway. “They made an emergency landing. The team is off the plane. Everyone’s alive, just being checked by paramedics. Ilya is okay.”
The words don’t penetrate the fog, not at first. It isn’t until his phone lights up, buzzing insistently against the deadened nerves in his palm, that Shane finally comes back to life.
Ilya’s contact picture fills the screen, a silly photo of a bear with its tongue out. He slides to accept the call, and then Ilya’s actual face is filling the screen, and the relief Shane feels is so sharp it might puncture a fucking lung.
He doesn’t know what his own face is doing, but it must be bad, because Ilya’s neutral mask collapses into total devastation. “Любовь моя,” Ilya murmurs in a rasp, “I am so sorry I scared you.”
He looks exhausted, face drawn and tense. He looks beautiful. Shane can’t stop staring.
“Ilya,” he whispers, “Ilya, fuck, you’re—”
“I am okay.” Ilya’s voice comes tinny and small through the speakers. “Was a lot. Very scary. But we are all okay. Not even a scratch.”
“I’m going to give you guys a moment,” Hayden murmurs in what appears to be a very rare moment of tact. “I’ll get you something to drink, okay? You good to be alone?”
“He is not alone,” Ilya says, a little bit of characteristic haughtiness seeping back into his tone, “He is with me.”
Hayden just shakes his head, claps a hand on Shane’s shoulder, says, “Glad you’re alright, Rozanov.”
Ilya pauses, then makes a face like he’s decided to allow it. “Thank you, Pike.”
And then Hayden leaves, and Shane’s still staring at Ilya. He’s alive. He’s safe. He’s fucking with Hayden. He’s looking at Shane like he’s afraid he’ll break in two.
“This is real,” Shane says, just to check.
“Yes,” Ilya agrees.
“You’re safe.”
“Yes.”
Shane’s vision goes blurry. His throat feels tight. “God, I just—I thought—I saw it, on one of the TVs in the stadium. The plane. I thought—”
“I know,” Ilya murmurs, gentle like a prayer, “Me, too. I’m sorry, I should not have scared you with those texts.”
Shane laughs around a hiccuping sob, presses a hand over his eyes until he sees stars. “You sent me your last fucking words.”
He can hear the smile in Ilya’s voice. “Very dramatic, I know.”
Shane shakes his head, lets it drop forward. There’s nowhere to put all this misplaced grief. Ilya is dead, but he's right here. Shane is alone, but he's not. He’d give anything to be able to reach through the screen right now. Instead, all he has is pixels and the slightly distorted, absolutely perfect sound of Ilya’s voice.
“I meant them,” Ilya says, sudden and a little rushed. “The texts. Everything.”
Shane tries to smile. It’s wobbly, but it’s real. “I know, you poetic fuck.”
Ilya laughs, sharp and loud. Off-screen, someone calls his name. There’s a rustling, a few other voices. An ambulance in the distance. Ilya glances away, nods once. It’s sharp, decisive. Leading comes so naturally to him. “Shane, sweetheart, I—”
“Go,” Shane says, trying to sound more confident than he feels. He needs to get himself together, and he needs to do it fast. It’s not like he can walk up to his coach and say he can’t do a post game interview because his fucking boyfriend almost died. Hayden can only buy him so much time. “Go be captain. Your team needs you.”
Ilya watches him for a long moment, like he can commit Shane to memory through sheer force of will. “I love you.”
“I love you so much,” Shane says, all in one breath. “Call me when you get the chance, okay?”
“I will,” Ilya promises, then pauses. “You will be alright?”
“No,” Shane says, and Ilya snorts. “Will you?”
“Maybe,” Ilya says, “Probably not.”
Shane waits until Ilya hangs up. He drops his head in his hands, lets his phone slide off his lap. He breathes. Thinks of a world where Ilya couldn’t call back. A world where he goes home alone, and stays alone, and lives the rest of his life in a waking death.
It isn’t this life, but it could have been. It almost was.
The door opens. Hayden slips inside, offering Shane a water bottle. “Coach is looking for you,” he says, apologetic, “I tried to stall, but—”
A mask of calm slides over Shane’s face, settles into his bones. “No, it’s okay. I’m good.”
Hayden doesn’t look convinced. “Shane, buddy…”
“Let’s go. I’m fine.”
And to the rest of the world, he is. He answers the same ten fucking questions and makes polite eye contact with every stupid reporter. He keeps his fingers folded neatly on the table, the very picture of calm, cool, and collected. His hands don’t shake. His lip doesn’t tremble. He is his mother’s son, after all.
“Shane,” one reporter calls, “Shane, do you have a comment on the Centaur’s emergency landing?”
If the smile on his face goes brittle, no one notices. No one would think to. He clears his throat, says, “Obviously, I am so glad everyone made it out safely. My thoughts are with the players and their families.”
He nods, fields another question, and tries very hard not to picture a body hitting the ground.