Chapter Text
The low-grade buzzing headache had taken root in Ilya’s temples that morning and not let go. He had made every effort to get rid of it, then ignore it, and none of it had worked. Willing himself to go through the motions of the day - meals, photos for the Centaurs’ social media pages, practice, but blessedly no game - had been tougher than he would have liked to admit. Practices were ramping up in intensity as the preseason had given way to regular games.
It was Shane’s second year as a Centaur, and the comfortable vibe of the team was mostly a blessing, but on days like these, it could feel like a breaking point for Ilya. While the Bears had been boisterous, it was largely surface-level connection. The Centaurs, however, knew Ilya’s tells and wouldn’t hesitate to call him out.
He tried his best to bury it. He had managed to keep his depression diagnosis a secret between him, Shane, Terry the team doctor, and Galina, his therapist. Nobody on the team knew why their captain occasionally looked a thousand miles away but that didn’t stop them from reaching out when they thought he needed help.
As much as Ilya appreciated their care, he was their captain and needed to set the example. So, all day he had worked through the headache, and only then, as Shane drove them home from the rink, did he allow himself to rest his forehead on the cool glass of the car window. He could feel Shane’s gaze on him but ignored it in favor of focusing on the limited relief he got from the cold surface.
“How did you feel about practice today, Ilya?” Shane prompted.
Ilya could sense the probing in the question and settled for a vague “Good, you agree? Haas’ backhand has been improving,” effectively steering the conversation away from any dangerous territory.
Shane nodded and hummed, reaching out to turn up the radio. The bass in the pop song that begins filling the car creates a buzzing in the car door’s speaker by where Ilya laid his head. He closed his eyes for just a second, willing himself to put up with it as the minutes on the map back home to the cottage ticked down. The pop song ended and Ilya chased the relief of its absence, but no more than a moment later, a second, even worse one began.
“Horrible music, Hollander.” Ilya complained, sitting back up to fiddle with the radio channels. He selected the classical music station Shane listened to on long drives and settled back into the seat with a satisfied huff.
“You say horrible music and then you change it to some Beethoven shit.” Shane tapped a finger to the beat of the music on the steering wheel regardless. “And you call me boring.”
“All of your radio is horrible and boring,” Ilya replied, “This one is just the best of the worst. Like Pike on Voyageurs.”
Shane rolled his eyes but didn’t respond as the street up to the cottage appeared. The second the car was in park, Ilya ran his hand suggestively up Shane’s arm until he was cupping his husband’s cheek.
“Come shower with me, moy lyubimyy?” Ilya suggested, pressing a kiss to the corner of Shane’s confused mouth.
“You asshole, I was worried you were sick or something!” Shane admitted, exasperated.
“I am Russian, we do not get sick, you know that by now.” Ilya said, hoping it was convincing. In actuality, he was hoping the hot steam of the shower would soothe his headache enough that he could have dinner with Shane afterwards like normal.
Shane gave him a long look that Ilya broke off, getting out of the car and grabbing both his and Shane’s bags from the trunk. Shane followed behind him, still cautious but the concern less prevalent.
In their bedroom, Ilya dropped their bags on the ground, ignoring Shane’s note of disapproval when he immediately began stripping his clothes off haphazardly as he walked into the bathroom and turned the water on.
“Ilya, you can’t just leave this-” Shane protested, cut off by a kiss from his husband.
“Bags will still be there after shower,” Ilya pulled him in the bathroom, “and you are wearing far too many clothes right now.” He added, stripping Shane’s shirt off him.
“What’s gotten into you?” Shane asked, finishing taking off his clothes as Ilya got into the shower.
“Wrong question.” Ilya pulled Shane under the spray of the showerhead. “You should be asking what is about to get into you.”
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Frustratingly, the quickie in the shower amongst the steam and Shane’s careful washing of his hair afterwards did nothing to soothe the ache in his skull. If anything, it had gotten worse. The combination of tiredness and hunger had made his brain feel like it was on fire.
Ilya never took painkillers, on principle, but the next day was the Centaurs' first game against Montreal of the season. He knew that if the headache kept up, he would be unable to sleep that night, and a loss against Montreal because of his tiredness at the start of the season would not be good for the Centaurs’ morale. Shane kept a bottle of Ibuprofen in the house, but Ilya didn’t know where, on his own behalf. Reasonably, he knew that if he asked Shane for some, his husband would undoubtedly help him, but that would mean he would have to admit to the headache, and Shane would also undoubtedly jump to conclusions about his depression. The last thing he wanted to do was worry Shane before a Montreal game.
“Are you going to make dinner?” Shane asked, looking refreshed from the shower as he sat on their bedroom floor putting their clothes away.
“We order in?” Ilya offered, dreading the idea of cooking.
Shane considered this and easily shrugged in agreement. “This means we’re cooking tomorrow night though, after the game.”
“Nyet, tomorrow we will be in shitty club eating shitty bar food celebrating our win.” Ilya pointed out.
“But what if I want to be all domestic with my hockey player husband after I have to pretend I don’t want to jump him whenever he scores a goal all game long?” Shane reached up from the floor to wrap his arms around Ilya’s hips above his head in a stupid, loose hug.
“So spoiled.” Ilya rolled his eyes as he sat down next to Shane, pulling a delivery app up on his phone.
“Where are you ordering from?” Shane asked curiously.
“Russian place downtown,” Ilya grunted. “Shchi.”
Shane’s face flicked uncomfortably for a second before settling into something more neutral.
Normally, when they ordered in, they would each pick an entree and then share an appetizer. Although Shane didn’t hold himself as harshly to his macrobiotic diet as he had in the past, he still used it as guidance for meals, especially before a game. The Russian place did not offer single servings, nor did any of the menu offerings align with Shane’s diet. They rarely ate Russian food because of it, but Ilya craved the easy familiarity of the dishes he had grown up with. The owners of the Russian restaurant were from the same area of Russia his mother had grown up in, and although nothing ever truly reminded Ilya of home, their food brought him back to easier times in his childhood.
Shchi reminded him of his mother pressing the back of her hand to his forehead during his boundless youth on the rare days where he managed to practice himself to exhaustion on the rink. Irina never stood up for herself against the overwhelming force of Grigori Rozanov, but for her Ilyushka, she would quietly assert good food and rest as a cure-all when his father spoke in critique of Ilya’s laziness.
“Food will be here in half an hour.” Ilya announced, placing the order.
Shane hummed under his breath, getting up to put their clean clothes back into the dresser as Ilya stayed on the floor, dimming his phone screen to try to distract himself with a scroll through Twitter until the food was delivered.
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Once the food arrived, Ilya successfully convinced Shane to sit with him on the couch as they shared spoonfuls of the warm soup. The familiarity of the meal offered more comfort to Ilya’s aching head than anything else that day had. He silently ran his thumb on his mother’s cross necklace around his throat when Shane was distracted with his napkin. The sun had set by the time they had finished dinner, Shane getting up to load their bowls and utensils into the dishwasher.
“Hey, I think I’m going to take a little Ibuprofen before bed, I’m a little sore from that trip I took during warm ups,” Shane announced from the kitchen. “Do you want some? That practice-check from Dykstra looked like he pushed you in a weird spot.”
Ilya resisted the urge to glare at Shane’s words. They both knew he was lying. Shane’s trip had been a stumble at most, and Dykstra’s check had had no real force behind it. “I do not need it, no. Amber Pike hits harder than Evan.” He settled on.
Shane frowned. “You got Russian food,” he stated.
“And?” Ilya turned away, picking his phone up from the table.
“And?” Shane repeated, coming back into the living room. “Ilya, no, talk to me, sweetheart. You know I don’t really like Russian food and I know because of that, you only insist on it when you feel like shit. And everything’s going so good with Galina so I assumed it was something physical. Dehydration, muscle soreness, I don’t know.” He reached out to grab Ilya’s wrist. “Are you having a bad day? Let me help you, Ilya. Tell me what’s wrong.”
“Nothing’s wrong.” Ilya pulled his wrist back. “Stupid headache, minor, is all. Developed in shower. English joke, ah, you blow my brain out, da? I will sleep it off.”
“Headache…” Shane muttered. “No way it developed in the shower. Not with how you were in the car, how you,” he sighed, “are. You’ve had a bad headache all day, haven’t you.”
“Hollander,” Ilya tried.
“Ilya, I’m your husband, don’t ‘Hollander’ me.” Shane protested. “I know you. Come on. I’m getting you some Ibuprofen, just one measly 200mg. It’ll help.”
Ilya stared as Shane went into the kitchen, digging through a junk drawer for an unassuming envelope which he tipped one round, red pill out of. Red painkiller pills, like the ones his father had forbidden from their house after his mother’s overdose. Most days, Ilya could handle the visual reminder, but with the taste of the shchi still in the back of his throat and his headache begging for the memory of his mother’s gentle hand, the pill was too much. He locked his jaw in defiance as Shane turned towards him in wordless prompting, a tiny red harbinger of death in one hand and a glass of water in the other.
“Ilya.” Shane prompted after a beat.
“Yes, mom,” he mocked, regretting the words the second they hung in the air between him and Shane. Shane’s face scrunched up in confusion and hurt.
Ilya turned away from Shane, setting his eyes on the path to their bedroom. He sat on Shane’s side of the bed, leaving the door open as a cautious peace offering, and took a deep breath. He tried to think of what Galina might say but it felt stupid. Shane was his husband, not Galina’s. How could he not know what to say? He couldn’t just be honest and say sorry, moy lyubimyy, you reminded me of my dead mother. Shane would surely get him benched for tomorrow’s game and in a meeting with Galina instead.
Shane appeared in the doorway, no longer holding the pill or the glass of water. In his tired face, Ilya could see the sweetness of Shane’s care for him. Shane had traded the pill for a bottle of a purple liquid and a damp cloth. He made eye contact with Ilya, and when no words were uttered, came over to sit next to his husband.
“Where is the pill?” Ilya asked quietly.
“I put it away,” Shane said calmly. “But I don’t want you to be hurting. Sweetheart, I have a liquid painkiller. Do you think you could do just a small dose of it? I have a warm cloth too, I just,” he shrugged, losing his confidence. “I don’t know, I thought it might help.”
As much as Ilya wanted to protest, knowing the liquid painkiller was probably a children’s medicine, kept for when the Pikes came over, his overwhelming relief that Shane had chosen not to mention the mom comment won over the humiliation. He knew Shane would be unwilling to rest until he had found a solution for Ilya’s pain, and the topic of the red pill Ibuprofen would surely come up again if Ilya didn’t take the offer in front of him.
“Okay.” He agreed, managing to sound even.
The tension drained out of Shane’s shoulders as he scrambled to measure a dosage into the cup at the top of the bottle, clearly expecting protest. Ilya accepted the small cup and took a deep breath before swallowing the bitter liquid. He knew Shane was watching carefully, so he stuck his tongue out at his husband to prove he had swallowed it all.
“Okay.” Shane repeated Ilya’s previous word. “I know it’s a little early but let’s get to bed, honey, yeah? Uh, Montreal and all tomorrow.”
“Yes.” Ilya said simply, getting up and going around the bed to strip his sweatpants and shirt into the laundry basket, leaving him exposed in boxers. Shane carefully removed his sweatpants and put them in his hamper, choosing to keep his t-shirt, an Irina Foundation one from their last camp, on. Shane laid down in bed and Ilya tucked beside him, settling as Shane gently placed the warm cloth on his forehead.
While the cloth eased some of his physical pain, getting to be close to his husband softened any ail.
“I feel better now,” Ilya told Shane, relaxing into the familiarity.
“Oh good, love.” Shane responded, pressing a kiss to the crown of Ilya’s blond curls. “Try to rest now.”
“I was mean to you,” Ilya admitted after a beat, in lieu of an apology.
Shane wrapped a soothing arm around him. “You were hurting. We figured it out. No fighting.” He shrugged. “Not a big deal. I’m just glad you’re feeling better.”
Ilya sighed, pulling the warm cloth further down his face to cover his eyes. Shane always seemed so measured. Obviously it wasn’t always true, especially with Shane’s tendency to get overwhelmed, but the overwhelm made sense. If Shane had a headache, he would’ve been able to take medicine before practice. Ilya probably wouldn’t have even realized.
Not for the first time, Ilya felt a stab of resentment towards his upbringing. He could never be angry towards his mother; he understood how the sadness had clung to her, how hard she had fought for him. He was angry at his father, a dead man, and himself for his jealousy of his husband’s normal childhood with Yuna and David Hollander. God bless the Hollander parents, for giving their son the patience of a saint to deal with Ilya’s issues.
Shane reached out to turn the lamp off, bathing the room in a darkness that coaxed the last of the pain from Ilya’s head.
“Ya tebya lyublyu.” Shane mumbled as he curled around Ilya, his breathing slowly evening out into sleep.
“Ya tozhe tebya lyublyu.” Ilya whispered back, resolving to prove how much he meant it to Shane the next day.