Chapter Text
Ilya was sitting at one of the tall tables that ringed Straw+berry up against the windows, a greenish-teal smoothie in one hand and his phone in the other. He looked kind of child-like as he kicked his feet and tilted his head back and forth to the beat of the indie pop rock music that Kip's boss insisted they play for the right vibe.
Scott leaned back against the front counter, his back to Kip as he made Scott his regular Blue Moon Over Brooklyn with an extra banana, and watched Ilya for a minute.
Ilya, who apparently wore his dead mother's crucifix.
Ilya who's father was not a good man, who was dying of a complicated disease, who had apparently been carrying the entire Rozanov family on his back through his entire hockey career.
Ilya who probably would've been happier being a teacher, of some sort, if his behaviour around the team's kids was anything to go off of.
Ilya who had become a hockey player to escape, his family yes, but more broadly to escape Russia.
Ilya Rozanov, Russia's prized hockey prodigy, who had secretly turned against them and done what was, objectively the right thing.
Ilya Rozanov who was bisexual, married to a man. And not any normal man, like Scott was starting to imagine for himself and Kip, but Shane motherfucking Hollander.
There was probably not a single more widely known hockey player in the world. Maybe, maybe at the height of his career Rocket Richard was up there. Dating Rose Landry hadn't helped with his visibility, either.
Scott considered the black ring that Ilya wore on his middle finger, he considered the brushed steel ring Hollander wore on his index finger. He considered how the only time he'd seen Ilya cry had been over Shane Hollander.
Shane Hollander who had no idea what he was doing to Ilya, probably. Because Shane Hollander was not known for being emotionally intelligent. He was polite, courteous, he did everything a Proper Role Model was supposed to do.
Proper role models from the MLH weren't gay, though.
Scott knew that, Ilya did too.
Scott had told his agent he wanted to come out, his agent who had sort of bumbled through trying to caution him against coming out. Not that it had done anything, Scott was still going to come out publicly. He wanted to come out to his team first.
He had it broken down in a list. First he wanted to come out to Vaughny, Huff, and Eric. Then Harv. Then the rest of the team.
"Thanks, Kip," Scott said, wishing he could lean over the counter and kiss him. Not a long, drawn out kiss, the sort of goodbye peck of the lips normal couples exchanged when they visited each other at work.
"You're welcome, Scott," Kip said, purposefully dragging his fingers along Scott's. It was electrifying in the best way. So maybe leaning over and kissing Kip wasn't an option, not yet, but it would be. Right now Scott wasn't sure he could handle what it would do to his brain.
"You are very bad at hiding," Ilya chirped in the empty smoothie shop.
"No we're not," Kip shot back.
"You are," Maria helpfully added from the back room. Scott had met Kip's friends a few days ago, officially, and had been downright delighted to hear how obvious Kip had been.
"Maria is smart, listen to her," Ilya added.
Maria carried two metal containers of pre-chopped fruit to the front and slid them into the fruit bar set into the counter. "This is why you're my favourite hockey player."
Ilya beamed around his straw.
Scott wondered how many friends Ilya actually had. He'd mentioned Svetlana, the coach's son in Russia who he'd fucked through his teen years, and Shane Hollander.
The idea of Ilya growing up without any friends he didn't fuck... That sorta broke Scott's heart, a little.
None of the Boston players had seemed to have any deeper sort of friendship with him. At the very least Ilya hadn't seemed interested in meeting up with any of them for Christmas.
So maybe Ilya still didn't have any friends. Besides Scott, who would probably kick anyone's ass who called them friends.
Kip grabbed one of the baked oatmeal bars and carried it out and dropped it in front of Ilya. "Thanks for... Y'know."
"Hitting asshole Russian player for being asshole?" Ilya surmised.
Scott scoffed, rolling his eyes as he sat next to Ilya, Kip standing between them. "I could've taken him."
"Yes but Kip does not like you fighting," Ilya pointed out.
"And it's literally part of the game," Scott shot back. "The game we're paid to play."
Ilya shrugged. Kip squeezed Ilya's shoulder.
"Besides, is always fun to punch a homophobe," Ilya added. "Plenty of options for that in MLH."
"What did he even say?" Kip asked.
Ilya answered with a Russian phrase that neither Scott or Kip understood. "Is like... F slur but worse. There is historical things behind it, old prejudices. Is hard to explain fully. And he said it like I would agree, like I would back him up."
Kip scoffed. "Well that was a huge miscalculation on his part."
"Massive," Ilya agreed.
"Then he just broke out the English one. In Vaughny's earshot," Scott sighed. "He's going to get worse about it, isn't he?"
"About punching homophobes?" Ilya clarified and Scott nodded. "Now he is punching for his sister, who is not on ice or able to hear the words. So yes. We will all get worse," Ilya promised, making air quotes with his fingers.
"Isn't that a good thing?" Kip asked.
Scott winced. "There was a player a couple years ago, at the All Star game, year before your rookie season. He used a slur for Japanese people, Vaughny sent him to the ice in about thirty seconds. Harv declared open season on the guy when we played his team." Scott did grin at that, though, recalling how much fun it had been to whale on a bigoted racist fuck and make it clear where New York stood. "It uh, didn't end great for him."
Kip looked at Scott for a long moment. "There's a recording of that game somewhere, right?"
"I mean probably, but it's basically one long drawn out fight. Took his teammates about two shifts to realize we didn't give a fuck about the rest of them." Scott looked at Ilya who was frowning. "What?"
"I did not hear about this?"
Scott shrugged. "The MLH swept it under the rug, had the guy retire. Better to have him say it was the last season without any Asian players to white guys and get his ass beat for it than say it to Hollander and get smacked with racial discrimination lawsuits."
Ilya squinted. "Does Hollander know?"
Scott shrugged again. "No idea. Probably tangentially, at least. Montreal didn't go easy on the guy either, and it was the one team Ottawa won a game against that season."
Ilya's eyes moved back and forth from side to side, the way he frequently did when he was thinking too much or too fast to translate any of it.
"He hasn't been in the league for 8 years. Hasn't been anywhere near it since his retirement ceremony." Scott took a sip of his smoothie. "Like Harv says, hockey's a white bastard's game and the League loves to drag their heels to keep it that way."
Ilya hummed, eyes stilling on a near murderous look. "I would like to talk to that player someday."
Not for the first time Scott wondered how Shane Hollander was so unaware of how much Ilya loved him.
It had become a near daily occurrence since Ilya's confession. It put their whole careers into an entirely new perspective. Every time the League pushed them together for interviews or promotions or stage bits at the awards, every time they met on the ice, they fell into bed together.
It was obvious to Scott, now that he knew, looking at how Ilya looked at Shane on the ice. There was competitiveness and there was a hefty amount of what could be construed as admiration but was, at least in Scott's opinion, adoration. How no one had put it together on their own was...
Well.
No one thought Scott was anything besides an uptight, paragon of the ideal hockey player. Yes talking about sex made him uncomfortable. He wasn't ever good at faking interest in his teammates' sexual exploits and he certainly had none of his own that he would even think about sharing. So he was hockey focused, would throw down his gloves and fight when needed, was a good enough player and leader to have been captain of the Olympic men's team...
So maybe it was easy to dismiss things when there was another, more typical explanation.
Ilya simply admired Shane's hockey ability. Scott was simply focused on hockey and didn't have time to date seriously. Nothing to see here.
How many other things had he dismissed in favour of the easier, "normal" explanation?
He didn't want to think of how many things he'd missed, how many players he'd looked in the eye and assumed incorrect things about them, how many players he could've found a kinship with if he'd been a little more open.
Yes he wanted to come out to be with Kip, but there was part of him that wondered...
How many guys were close to taking that step for his own reasons? How many guys had almost done it, and backed out?
"Ilya?" Kip called and Scott looked at Ilya to find his angry expression replaced with a glassy, empty look, his phone held to his ear.
He watched as the playful light drained from Ilya's eyes, watched as he turned pale, watched as the hand holding his drink started to tremble. It was nearly imperceptible but Scott's job was to notice things his teammates hid.
Ilya lowered the phone and typed a number into the phone screen and then started to speak in a thick voice, Russian syllables sounding like every single once of them were punched out by bricks hurled at his stomach. When he lowered the phone again it was clutched tight in his hand.
"Roz?" Scott pressed. Ilya wordlessly shook his head. Scott felt dread claw at his throat. "Is it your father?" Ilya nodded. "Is he..." Ilya nodded again.
"Fuck, okay, we're about to get the mid-afternoon rush, so uh, Maria stick him in the freezer, Scott you look up tickets, I'll call the car," Kip said.
Ilya had looked like a child minutes earlier for an entirely different reason than he looked like one now. Now he looked like a terrified, aimless, lost child.
Scott looked up tickets.
Maria guided both of them to the back so they wouldn't cause a commotion.
Ilya seemed to ghost through the motions. Scott emailed the ticket check-in to Kip who printed it out on the office printer and pressed the paper into Ilya's hands as he left for Scott's car.
Scott waited in the back and thought about calling Shane Hollander.
He thought about it for a while. He thought about it when he called Harv and told him. He thought about it when he sent a text to the team group chat. He thought about it when he had no one left to call or text.
"Hello?" An unsure voice answered when Scott picked up.
"Hey, it's Scott. Hunter, in New York," Scott said.
"Oh. Hi, Scott... Why are you calling me?" Shane asked.
"Roz just got a call from his brother, in Russia." Scott heard Shane inhale sharply.
"His father..." Shane assumed.
"Yeah. We just sent him to the airport. I uh..." I know you're fucking I know you're married I know he loves you and you better fucking love him back because he fucking deserves it. "I know you're... Close," he settled on.
Shane was silent on the other end.
"I won't say anything, not to anyone," Scott added quickly. "I just... Thought you should know. He wasn't... He didn't look good. I know you can't go with him for... Obvious reasons but. You should know. The Admirals are going to release a statement that he's not playing for the week at least. The easiest flight path for him to get there is to Prague, then from Prague to Helsinki, then Helsinki to Minsk and then to Moscow. It's like, 36 hours straight of flying. I dunno how he'll be coming back but-"
"He told you?" Shane interrupted, voice flat.
"Yeah. 2014, WADA, CCM shoot... Yeah. He told me. A little bit ago. After the All Stars break."
"Oh." It was still flat.
"Are you... Alone?" Scott asked.
"Yes?"
Scott glanced out the back stock room and stepped into the freezer, the door swinging shut behind him. "I'm gay, too."
"What?"
"Yeah, Ilya kinda... Sniffed it out, I guess? I'm gonna come out after the season ends, but right now..." Right now you've got ammo so it's mutually assured destruction. "Look I'm not gonna tell anyone. I get it. And he... He's probably gonna need you. Losing a parent isn't easy, losing a shitty one is probably a lot more complicated."
He heard Shane take a deep breath. "What time does his last flight land?"
"Uh," Scott pulled up the itinerary. "7am local time. That's like, midnight-ish for Eastern, I dunno where you're playing-"
"It'll take him a couple hours to get settled at least, he'll probably have to go to the hospital and funeral home to pay for things. I'll... There's a friend of his in Boston, Svetlana, she's Sergei Vetrov's daughter. They grew up together. You should call her, if she hasn't already heard. She can... Be there. For him." Like I can't be Shane seemed to add.
"Okay, I'll figure out how to call her."
"I'm going to call him before his plane takes off."
"Okay. See you in a couple weeks, Hollander."
"Bye Hunter."
The phone line clicked and Scott started running through the contacts in his phone, eventually he got a hold of someone on the Raiders who had Svetlana's number and Scott managed to get a hold of her. She was in France, she managed to finagle the exact right flights to get there twelve hours before Ilya would land.
And then Scott had nothing to do except come to terms with the fact that he was, in fact, very fond of the little Russian fucker who was, officially, an orphan.
One more thing they had in common.