Chapter Text
Shane Hollander is, famously, a mild tempered man. He’s never been one to rise to anger or frustration, barring that one time Scott Hunter made a too-close-to-home chirp about Ilya on the ice. He’s rarely involved in fights, usually channelling his anger and frustration into scoring more goals than the other team and he relishes in the smugness he gets at trouncing his opponents.
But currently, Shane Hollander is really fucking angry.
The weight of his initial confusion after waking up from the coma has settled deep into his chest. The past few weeks have been nothing short of exhausting; he’s been in a whirlwind of CT scans, Physiotherapy reviews, Occupational Therapy assessments, Doctors ward rounds and so much Speech and Language Therapy. And he’s really fucking tired of speech and language therapy. Especially because the only word he can seem to say with any kind of consistency today is:
“Fuck.”
The woman opposite him, Lena, gives him a gentle smile, it’s not pitying, thankfully. Shane doesn’t know what to do with pity and he’s sick of having people look at him like they feel bad for him. She isn’t that much older than Shane is himself, she seems nice enough as far as speech therapists go but Shane really doesn't have the patience for it today.
“I appreciate it’s frustrating,” Lena says softly, pointing again at the word on the page, “can we try this one again?”
Shane stares at the word before taking a deep breath and starting again, “P- p- p- No! Fuck sake, I know it. P- p-.”
He growls in frustration, the word ‘because’ sits on the page, mocking him. He knows exactly what it says, it’s on the tip of his tongue and his brain is screaming it on repeat but he cannot get the correct letter to pass his lips. He’s aware being angry about it doesn’t help; the more annoyed he gets, the worse his speech becomes and it tortures him in a vicious cycle as he desperately tries to push past it but he can’t.
“Fucking- fucking why?” His head feels like it’s about to explode, not from pain but red, hot rage.
Lena gives him a second to elaborate on his question but instead he just looks at her, willing her to have the answers he’s seeking without him having to ask.
“The beginning letters b and p sound similar and are created by similar mouth movements, it’s not uncommon for the two to be challenging.” She offers up.
“No, not–,” Shane sighs and leans back in his chair, eyes on the ceiling, gathering his thoughts, “yesterday was easy. So much more over the tannoy– so much more over–.”
He takes several seconds and a few deep breaths before sitting up straight again.
“Yesterday I talked more,” He cast his mind back to laughing with Ilya, inviting him to the cottage, sharing soft kisses until his parents returned to visit, “today is hard. I know it.” He points to the word on the page, “Read it, know it. Fucking can’t say it. Fucking stupid.”
“Okay, first of all, you’re not stupid so we need to quit that kind of thinking. Second, you had a really full day yesterday; lots of visitors, you had OT in the morning assessing you and you walked up and down the ward several times.”
Shane opens his mouth to argue that he was a professional hockey player and that walking up and down the ward was literally nothing to him but Lena holds up her hand to stop him.
“No, don’t fight me on this. Your brain is tired, it’s had a long day yesterday, you probably slept badly because sleep is always disturbed in hospital and it hasn’t had enough rest. Today is a harder speech day because you’re tired and frustrated. It’s not a reflection on you as a whole, it’s a chance for you to reflect on how pushing yourself in this kind of situation isn't helpful and causes anger and upset.”
He meets her eyes and swallows hard, “It will go all the way though?”
She watches him, allowing him to try the sentence again in his own time.
“It will,” he pauses, “go away though?”
“I can’t say for sure it’ll ever fully go away, Shane. You’ve made huge improvements since I first started seeing you. You’re consistent with yes/no responses, you’re able to realise when you’ve made mistakes, you’re consciously taking more time to rethink your sentences and to try them again. Hopefully you continue to improve, that’s the aim here, and hopefully you’ll reach a point where your communication isn't a challenge anymore. But we need to acknowledge that it might still slip up when you’re fatigued, even if you don’t feel it physically, this is your brain saying ‘Hey Shane, yesterday was a bit much, I need a break’.”
Tears gather in his eyes as he listens; Shane has always been an anxious man, his brain loves nothing more than to catastrophize and currently it’s racing at a thousand miles per second.
“A brain injury doesn’t magically go away on its own,” Lena says kindly, “you took a huge hit on the ice and it’ll take a while to heal. You’ll have good days and harder days, just like anyone does, but your harder days will be more obvious to you. For the time being at least. I know it’s really hard to be patient and to give yourself time.”
Shane nods, allowing some of the tears to fall from his lashes as he listens.
“It’s really fucking hard.” He says quietly.
“And that’s okay.” Lena acknowledges, “You’re allowed to think this is ‘really fucking hard’, because it is. Don’t let that thought consume you though, ‘this is really fucking hard but tomorrow it’ll be easier’.”
He smiles ruefully, “You’re good. Should hire you for the operational beamer.” He frowns for a moment, “Moti-va-tional speaker. On the team.”
“Do you have any jobs going?” She asks lightly.
“No,” He smiles wider, wiping his face with a tissue before looking down at the laminated card in front of him, “Because.” He states, pointing at the word.
Lena nods and smiles, gathering up the cards and standing, “Excellent. I think we’ve done enough for today.”
He watches her leave and sighs to himself. He’s never been good at being unwell, he’s also never had much experience with hospitals outside of the typical concussion. The first few days he was awake, he wasn’t really aware. Words slipped through his brain like water, the lights danced in front of his eyes which made his head hurt and the drugs- well actually the drugs were pretty decent until they started weaning him off them.
He stretched his arms out in front of him, initially they thought he’d broken his collarbone but it turns out it was a very dramatic bruise. He was grateful for that, the last thing he needed on top of the whole speech thing was a broken collarbone and assistance to shower and dress himself. Not that the OT hadn’t already tried that, the guy had watched him shower from a distance, ensuring Shane knew the correct order to take a shower and that he didn’t pass out or anything while he did so.
They also made him go to a little kitchen to make tea and toast, not that Shane would ever consume either of those things. He then had to do an assessment that involved drawing clocks and remembering an address - that was harder, not because he couldn’t remember but because saying the address had been a task and a half.
The Physio had also visited, ensuring Shane could walk down the ward independently and that he could manage stairs. He completed those tasks with an air of exasperation, reminding them that he was a professional athlete. The woman didn’t look impressed as she made him walk up three more flights of stairs until he finally acknowledged that he was feeling tired.
He’d passed everything with flying colours, aside from speech therapy. Even he could acknowledge that he needed more time; his biggest fear was being unable to communicate in an emergency, something he’d never even thought to consider while living alone. His next biggest fear was that he wouldn’t be able to communicate with his family or friends, or Ilya.
Shane’s mind wandered as he thought about the cottage and spending several weeks with the Russian. He thought about the rush of words that Ilya had released while they were alone the day prior.
‘I don’t want to be friend.’
He smiled to himself, he’d wanted more with Ilya for longer than he cared to admit. It felt good to know that Ilya had been thinking the same. He thought of the soft kisses they’d shared together, the gentle caresses and lingering touches, all so far out of reach while his parents had been hovering in the room. He also thought of grabbing hands, a warm tongue licking down his chest and rough gasps into each other's mouths as Ilya railed him into his own mattress. The possibility that he could have both the sweet and the savoury, for want of a better term, felt too good to be true but he let himself hope.
Shane looked at the clock, it was almost time for visiting hours, he knew Ilya would be returning for one more afternoon before he had to fly to Boston for his next home game. He kept himself quiet in his chair, fiddling absently with his hoodie string as he waited.
“Mr Hollander?”
He started violently, almost smacking his head into the back of the chair as his Doctor’s face appeared in his visual field, far too close for someone who had just walked into the room.
“What the fuck?”
“Ah, you’re back with me, good.”
“Back? What?” Shane blinked and looked at the clock again, it had barely been a minute since he’d last checked it but he hadn’t heard the Doctor enter the room, nor had he seen him walk over to Shane’s chair.
The Doctor frowned slightly, “Did you not hear me knock? You seemed pretty out of it when I came in.”
Shane shook his head, willing his pounding heart to settle down, “No, no? Nothing… what the fuck?” He asked again because he couldn’t help it.
“Has this been happening often?”
“What?”
“The zoning out, not hearing people enter a room?”
Well he’s always been a bit of a day dreamer but he’s never been that bad.
“I don’t…” He doesn’t really know how to respond, how’s he supposed to know if he’s been zoning out? Shane watches the Doctor’s face as he shrugs but he can’t quite grasp the expression on it.
“Hm, we’ll keep monitoring this Mr Hollander, I’ll ask your visitors if they’ve noticed you doing the same. I also want you to try and make a note of it, which I appreciate is hard if you can’t tell it’s happening.”
Shane swallows and nods slowly, “Why?”
“Monitoring seizure activity, you had a pretty colossal seizure on the ice and a second in ICU. You’re on medication to combat them but we might not have you on the right drugs.”
He speaks so casually for someone delivering some pretty big news, Shane thinks. He also would quite like his Mom to be here for these kinds of discussions, he’s never been good with keeping medical information in his brain.
“Will they be in them for the long while?”
“You could be on them for life, we don’t know that yet. Still needing to figure things out, which is why we want you to monitor it.”
Shane dislikes this Doctor; he never lets him fix his sentences before responding and half the time his assumptions of what Shane is trying to say isn’t even close, but he nods in understanding as he tries to not let his mind race.
“Hockey?” He knows he can’t play right now, but medications for life could impact on his ability to play in the future.
“How about we focus on one thing at a time.” The Doctor gives him, what he assumes, is a kind smile but Shane looks away at the clock again, willing time to move a bit quicker so he can be finished with this conversation and so he can see Ilya.
His Doctor takes his leave, Shane’s silence speaking louder than his words.
Ilya Rozanov might just be the prettiest boy in the world; he belongs on modelling sets and tv screens and definitely doesn’t belong in the washed out lighting that McGill University Health Centre casts upon his face. Yet, Shane can’t help but stare into those gorgeous blue eyes as he reaches out a hand to nudge one of his windswept curls behind Ilya’s ear.
“You look tired.” Ilya says, accent rolling on the ‘r’ as he casts his eyes over Shane’s face.
“Busy day,” Shane responds, “but better now.” He doesn’t have the energy for more words today, which is frustrating because he knows he won’t get to see Ilya for another few weeks.
“They have been kind to you, yes?” The question makes Shane smile softly.
“Yes.”
“They said we are having to monitor you for ‘zoning out’? I do not know this phrase.”
Shane ponders it in his mind for a moment, frowning to himself before responding, “Daydreaming? They wasn’t– it didn’t– fuuuuuuck.” He wipes his hands down his face in frustration.
“Take your time, is okay Shane.”
God, he might actually love this man and his patience; not that he would dare say that to Ilya just yet, he would probably think it was the brain injury talking.
Shane takes a measured breath before trying again, “They didn’t make it clear to me.”
“So they just ask us to monitor your daydreaming without telling you why?”
He’s too tired for this, he just wants to sit and listen to Ilya tell him stories about his day, about what’s happening with his team and who else has reached out over texts that Shane still isn’t allowed to read because the medics don’t want him looking at screens for too long.
Instead, he takes the communication book that sits on his table, opens it and finds the word ‘seizure’.
“They think you are having more?”
Shane shrugs before closing the book, “Tired.”
Ilya seems to understand what Shane wants, even without words. That’s another beautiful thing about him; how easy communication feels even when words can’t pass Shane’s lips and the heaviness of the situation starts to take its toll.
“You have phone, yes? Want me to read your texts to you?”
He is absolutely fucking perfect and I never want him to leave.
Shane reaches for his phone, handing it over to Ilya with a shy smile. Ilya takes it gently, keeping it in his hand as he swoops in to place soft kisses to Shane’s lips. He’s too fatigued to do much more, despite wanting to clamber into Ilya’s lap with his hands in those angelic curls.
“Ya tebya lyublyu.” Ilya whispers against Shane’s mouth.
He pulls away with a quizzical look; Ilya’s muttered phrases and nicknames and god only knows what else in Russian before, but this felt weighted. Deliberate. There’s meaning there that Shane can’t decipher and he cocks his head.
“What?”
Ilya gives him a rueful smile and shakes his head, “Just grateful you are still here.”
Shane narrows his eyes but nods anyway, it’s not like he’s able to even spell whatever's been said to plug it into a translation app later but the words feel familiar. He’s heard them before, yet he can’t quite place when. Instead he gets up from his chair and sinks into the hospital bed, moving as far over as he can and patting the empty space next to him for Ilya to crawl into.
“Is this not a little obvious?” Ilya jokes, looking to the door of the room like someone might walk in at any moment.
“Please?” He’s not embarrassed about the way his voice cracks, but exhaustion is settling in like a weighted blanket and he refuses to waste this final visit before Ilya leaves.
The bed creaks as Ilya climbs in; Shane settles himself into his side, relishing in the warmth of his body and the comforting smell of clean laundry and the Armani cologne he always wears. Ilya’s arm comes over to embrace Shane, unlocking Shane’s phone to read the texts from his friends aloud