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It was a dark and stormy night, everything tinted blue under the moonlight. Rozanov pulled up to the modern-built cabin house that his boyfriend had been in awe of at first sight, his brown duffel bag slung easily over one shoulder.
He slammed the car door to one of his favorite vintage cars (a steel-blue one) and took a quick look at the dark sky and into the trees. Not enough to properly survey the area, but enough to dissuade any irrational thoughts, which he’d be loath to admit he was all too familiar with.
He pulled out his phone on his last steps up to the house’s front entrance, pressing the on button and unlocking the door with the touch of a button. A red circle turned to green on his cellphone screen, and the flat triangle on the wooden door’s lock flashed a corresponding colour as the security system’s calm British voice said, “Door unlocking.”
As he opened the door, Rozanov mindlessly slid his phone into his back left pocket. When the door clicked shut again, he locked it from the inside by hand, as he always did.
He pulled off his denim jacket, exposing his shoulders to the cool atmosphere of his home, and slung it over a leather chair. Ilya was wearing a grey tank top, but didn’t care to change it.
He took a jar of long matches, pulled one out, and struck it to light against the jar. He watched as the red tip of the match burned black instantly. Kneeling, he tossed the lit match into his fireplace. Rozanov set the jar down on a side table after the fire had sufficiently caught. His posture relaxed a bit then, winding down from a long day of meetings and other bullshit. He was happy to leave it all behind as he looked into the flickering fire. His jaw momentarily rested against his right shoulder, his gaze soft and unfocused. But he wasn’t happy enough to just stare at a fire for hours while home alone.
After about three seconds of that peace, he stood up, turned around, and walked with a lazy gait. He picked up his script from a low table in the living room, deciding he should practice lines for the upcoming project Yuna had signed him up for.
The moment he sat, loud death metal blasted from across the house. Covering his ears with both hands, he ran to address the issue, practically whacking the front of the stereo to shut it up. He panted, resting both hands on either side of the stereo. He looked around, this time, enough to survey the area. He was still panting as he took a few small steps around. He found nothing.
Vzyat’ sebya v ruki. Pull yourself together. He ran both hands down his face, then across the sides of his hair.
So he went to the kitchen to start making dinner as a distraction. That, and he was hungry. The Hollanders had recently gifted Ilya home-grown ingredients for a pasta recipe he’d enjoyed, so he prepared the necessary boiling water, tomatoes and red peppers, a slotted spoon — everything set.
He took an imprecise handful of dry spaghetti noodles to feed to the pot. A sharp noise rang just enough to resonate as he picked up a knife to start cutting vegetables.
“Okay. . . .” he breathed. He began slowly rehearsing his lines with unrelaxed enunciation, “I spent all dinner . . .trying to hate the way you laugh.”
He inhaled a yellowish tomato, crunching on it as he mentally chewed on the dialogue.
Chto? What even is this project?
He hadn’t done much commercial work — or anything apart from what hockey required — since that shoot the summer before rookie season with Shane. Even then, he’d only done it because the advertisers liked his pitch about collaborating with Hollander. Yuna Hollander was quickly taken to Ilya as a second son rather than someone to hate, so he figured he shouldn’t fuck that up. He’d accepted with no questions asked.
Rozanov read it again, this time at a more natural pace, as he’d decided to let it take the back burner in his mind as he focused on cutting vegetables. Maybe he should have asked a few questions.
He swallowed before continuing, “You have this way of looking at me like you’re memorizing me,” and ate another half of a tomato after cutting it, humming with satisfaction. At least these tomatoes were making the experience more enjoyable.
Again. More casually. Bezzabotnyy. Nonchalant. “No, you know,” he pointed the knife at an imaginary scene partner, really getting into it now. “You have this way of looking at me,” he shook his head through these lines. The tomato he was currently chopping got away from him, rolling off the side of the counter and onto the floor.
He stared at it with mild disappointment for a moment. He knelt to pick it up, and the house alarm blared with flashing red lights to match. He covered an ear with the one free hand he had, looking up in shock before coming to his senses and running to the security system’s control panel.
He’d never noticed how unsettling it was to have house decorations that donned faces in the dark, and this was a mighty inconvenient moment to come to that realization.
His head whipped around as he punched in the code frantically. It finally shut off, leaving him panting in bluish darkness again, just the control panel lighting his face with a cold, dim glow.
He looked around. There wasn’t much to be done. Well, he probably should lock those glass doors he might’ve forgotten to before. So he did, wiggling them to test, knife still in hand as he did so.
He sat down on the piano bench, a bit frazzled by the ordeal, and his left elbow rested on it, playing a few discordant notes. He took a deep breath and leaned a little to take another look at his surroundings.
The landline rang, the white phone backlit eerily by the fish tank behind it. Rozanov picked it up on the next ring and spoke.
“Hello?” he said, hearing a slight echo of his own voice reverberating in his head. All he heard as he paced was someone breathing back at him, just as hard and intensely as he was. He looked out through the glass doors. The phone never left its place firmly against his left ear. He asked again with more attitude and melody behind it, “Hello?”
Lightning struck, lighting a looming figure clad in dark colors on the back patio out of Rozanov’s sight.
All at once, the lights from Ilya’s bedroom turned on to emit a yellow glow, and Rozanov flicked his face toward it, raising the knife without thinking.
“Okay, I’m not messing around!” he shouted, his voice housing a touch of gritty texture as he crept toward the door.
When he saw nothing, he sighed heavily and set his hand on the switch to turn the room’s lights off. The knife made a faint metallic sound as it scraped the surface when he brought his hand down.
With another heavy breath outward, he clicked the phone back into its receiver, feeling high-strung and a tad insane.
When the next bolt of lightning struck, Rozanov’s hold on the knife failed, and the point stuck into the wooden floor of the entrance hallway. With both hands in the air in an attempt at surrendering to the situation that had to have been made up in his mind, he spoke breathily to himself. “Okay, chill out.”
“Door unlocking,” the evil British door lady announced without permission the instant Ilya was low enough to the ground to retrieve the knife.
Rozanov’s head rose, watching helplessly in terror as he saw the latch twist into its unlocked position with a sickening mechanical whir. He felt a light vibration from his back pocket and pulled his phone out to check the notification.
Unknown Number: I’m coming for you
He had one other unread message, and he wondered idly if it might be Shane checking in while his team was celebrating at some bar after their game tonight. Ultimately, he figured the more important issue might be the imminent danger of some unknown person coming to get him. Some unknown person who had just sent another message: I’m here
Four knocks came in quick succession against the front door.
Rozanov pulled the knife from where it had stuck into the floor and stood up with determination.
The door creaked as Rozanov slowly pulled it open, knife in hand, ready to be used on whatever awaited him outside in the cold.
“I’ve been waiting for you,” the voice spoke, hard to hear over the heavy rain. The figure’s arms turned slightly out as he spoke. Male, certainly, though on the shorter side.
Rozanov just stared with his posture rigid, breathing so heavily that his shoulders heaved.
“I knocked on the door, I looked in the windows, I—I almost gave up. A—Are you uh, okay?” The figure stepped forward, shedding some light onto his face and the situation.
What awaited him was a startled Shane Hollander, wearing a heavy black raincoat with drenched hair even under the hood. He held his phone up to illustrate that he wasn’t here without reasoning.
Ilya stood with his mouth open for a moment, then spoke, hands gesticulating almost freely now that he wasn't afraid. “Oh. . . .See, I thought you were, like—”
“Okay! Woah. . . .” Shane stepped back half a step, eyes fixed on the knife in Ilya’s hand.
“Oh!” Ilya realized his mistake immediately and began to verbally defend himself. “No, no!”
“Cool. You know what—I ju—” Shane took another step back.
“It’s . . .for vegetables,” Ilya explained, feeling stupid. That stupid relief quickly dissipated into anger. “What is with unknown number?” Ilya demanded.
“Y—you called, and I saw the notification on my watch. My phone died because of all the . . .texting we were doing before the game. So I used one of the guys’ phones.”
“I did not call, Hollander! Why would you text me from another player’s cellphone? Was it Hayden? I thought we agreed not to tell,” Ilya rattled off as he adjusted his grip on the knife that was still held pointed at Hollander, fingers shaking on its black handle. Pochemu eto vsegda on? It’s always Hayden.
“Jesus Christ, Rozanov, can you put the knife down?!” Shane held his hands out in front of him.
“Sorry.” Ilya lowered the knife.
“Well,” he turned his palms to the sky as he explained, “it’s pretty easy to use one of the guys’ phones when they're drunk out of their minds. I deleted the messages afterward, of course.” Shane shrugged. “I just figured I should check on you since you rarely call without texting first, and I was nearby anyway.”
“Oh.” Well, it’s not like Hollander had ever been good at choosing the right tone for a text message. Or sending an appropriate emoji, for that matter.
“Care to tell me why you called? Or . . . ?” Shane gestured to the knife that now hung limply from between Ilya’s index finger and thumb.
“I . . .did not mean to,” he said quietly.
Ilya looked at his phone and saw how many tabs were open. He called back to how he may or may not have turned his phone off before putting it into his back pocket. The texts to ‘Unknown Number,’ bedroom light controls, calls to Shane and his own landline, alarm systems. . . .Bozhe moy, and heavy death metal.
It could've been Shane’s imagination or the low lighting, but he could've sworn Ilya flushed with embarrassment as he set the knife down and looked into the nearest reflective surface at his . . .ass?
“Are—did you buttdial me?” Shane asked, incredulous and doing a shit job of hiding it.
Ilya’s eyebrows furrowed with shame. “Ah, it did more than that tonight.” He looked up. “Not like that. It—the music, and alarm, and . . .text—calls. . . .” Ilya trailed off, losing coherence as he tried to explain.
“Well, your butt has caused me problems, too. It—it’s a nice one,” Shane shrugged and gave a painfully awkward smile. “The best, probably, so . . .” It could’ve been a joke, but this one wasn’t landing too definitely as such.
How was Shane being so genuine in this reassurance?
“There’s no escape,” Ilya muttered to himself.
“Hey, are you okay?” Shane asked quietly, shivering slightly as the cold set into his bones.
“Why are you still standing in the rain, Hollander?” Rozanov said without making direct eye contact. Rather, he was looking at Shane’s stupid little bangs, which were plastered to his forehead and directing water into his eyelashes, making them clump into black points, making him look ever more cartoonishly like an upset kitten.
Shane wasn’t looking into Ilya’s eyes, either. He was blinking harder every other time to squeeze the water out of his eyes. But he was so pretty.
Shane started to explain in full earnest, “I’m not gonna barge in. You haven't invi—”
And then Rozanov grabbed him by the collar and pulled him inside.
“Wait, wait, I'm getting your floor all wet!”
“Shut up,” Ilya murmured as he smiled into Shane’s lips, shutting the door behind them. “You are invited.” He gently pushed Shane against the door, kissing him fervently.
“Ilya. . . .” Shane tilted his head back to pull his mouth away from the other man.
Ilya grabbed his chin, but Shane resisted and maintained his position.
“Rozanov, seriously.”
He looked at the faint green flecks in Ilya’s eyes that sparkled under the terribly dark lighting of the cabin. He was so beautiful.
Ilya ceased all movement, but kept contact on Shane’s chin and the back of his neck, nodding once in encouragement.
“Ilya, you were scared.” Before Rozanov could interject with a denial (and he absolutely wanted to), Shane continued, “Understandably. I didn't mean to scare you. I actually—I meant to do quite the opposite.” Shane’s hand softly came up to cradle the side of Ilya’s neck.
Ilya let himself melt into the touch, lowering his own hands to rest on the curve of Shane’s waistline instead of their desperate position near Shane’s neck.
“Was stupid,” he grumbled, allowing Shane to pull him into a hug.
“Yeah, a little,” Shane chuckled. “But no one here’s blaming you. I could've thrown in an ‘It’s Shane, by the way,’ or something more like 'I’ll be there for you,’ than like ‘I’m coming to get you.’ I guess I responded before thinking.”
“So, coming to save your boyfriend in person after one missed call is your instinct?” he whispered into Shane’s ear.
“Shut up.” Shane buried his nose into Ilya’s curls. “Maybe a little.”
“Not even a heart emoticon to soften the tone?” he chided. “A little pink one, maybe?”
Now, it was Shane’s turn to blush, but his was undeniable, as always.
Ilya ran a thumb over the freckles he loved so much, only deepening the pink hue. “No, I find it . . .endearing, moya lyubov’,” Ilya breathed into the heated skin of Shane’s neck. “Sorry I pulled a knife on you.”