Work Text:
After a relaxing long weekend alone, it’s finally time to pick up the kids and head home. Hayden and Shane sit at the patio table talking while Jackie and Ilya wrangle the Pike Kid Trio, Amber is asleep, cuddled on Hayden's chest.
“I really appreciate this, man. We needed time to erm - reconnect,” Hayden says while licking his lips, a blush paints his cheeks.
“TMI, Hayd, God.” Shane waves him off. “But it was our pleasure having them. It was fun.”
“You’ll understand when you guys have a few rugrats. It’s fucking impossible to concentrate in the bedroom when at any second one of the little cockblockers might bust open the bedroom door like the goddamn Kool-Aid man.”
“Real nice how you talk about my godchildren,” Shane laughs, shaking his head.
“Mm-hmm. You’ll see. Let one of them find fuzzy handcuffs half-hanging out of your nightstand drawer, and then talk to me.”
“Jesus,” Shane makes a mental note to buy a lock box to store their collection of private items under the bed, just in case.
“But MOOOOOOOM,” Arthur whines. “Can’t I go on the jetski again - just five minutes?”
“I told you, no. You’ve been here all weekend, buddy - don’t you want to go home?” Jackie picks him up and balances him on her hip.
“Home is boring,” he mutters.
Ilya helps carry four duffle bags to Hayden’s truck. Ruby and Emma run down to the water to say goodbye to the little family of loons building a nest near the dock.
There are a few tears before the twins pile into the truck for the drive home.
“See you soon, girls!” Shane hugs them both, he high-fives Arthur.
“Bye Uncle Shane,” Ruby sniffles.
“Ey, Arthur, Ru-Ma,” Ilya uses his affectionate portmanteau nickname for the twins. “Don’t forget…the deal…” he says mysteriously, putting a finger to the side of his nose. The twins’ faces instantly light up.
“We won’t!” They say in unison.
“Okie dokes, guys, what do you say to Uncle Shane and Uncle Ilya?” Jackie prompts as she straps Amber into her booster seat.
“Thank you,” the three oldest say.
“Ah ah ah,” Ilya holds up one finger. “na russkom, pozhaluysta,”
“Spicy-butt,” the girls say. Arthur just giggles because well, 'butt' is a funny word.
Ilya pouts out his lower lip and shrugs. “Close enough.” He hugs all three of them and tweaks their noses affectionately, making a beeping noise each time.
Ilya and Shane wave goodbye as the Pikes drive away, arms around each others’ waists.
“That was fun,” Shane says.
“Da,” Ilya nods. “We will have to do that again soon.”
“Not too soon,” Shane says suggestively. Ilya pops an eyebrow. “Your balls are as blue as mine and you know it.”
“Yes, yes, true. C’mon, moy gamburger Let’s go to bed.”
“It’s early, I’m not that tired,” Shane says as Ilya heads into the house.
“Glad to hear it.” The Russian winks and drops his basketball shorts right there at the sliding door. He struts into the house and Shane follows eagerly.
The next morning starts slowly, everyone stayed up later than normal while they were away from home and it’s always a struggle getting back into the normal swing of things. Hayden stretches out on the sofa, PS5 controller in hand while Cal Kestis is not terribly successful at fighting Stormtroopers.
“I hate this stupid fucking game…” he grunts in frustration.
The security camera monitoring the driveway alerts him to a car pulling in. He ignores it, cars use their driveway to turn around all the time. Then it chimes a second time. By the time the third alert sounds from the motion detector closest to the house, his ears have perked up but Cal falls off another cliff and the character has to regenerate.
Stupid. Fucking. Game.
The twins come rocketing down the stairs and start screeching. It sounds like a whole parliament of owls coming from his front room.
“Guys - inside voices, please,” Jackie wearily calls out from the kitchen. She adores her children, really she does, but by the 80th time saying that exact phrase for the day, she wishes they all had a mute button. At least Amber is taking her late morning nap.
"Uncle Ilyas are here!" Ruby and Emma shout in unison. They point out the front window towards the driveway. Arthur comes out of his bedroom where he’d been building the Lego Titanic set that his Uncles gave him. He joins his sisters at the front door.
"What do you mean, girls? You just got home from Uncle Shane's house..." Jackie goes to the front door and pulls it open, thinking maybe one of the kids forgot something and Shane and Ilya were dropping it off. Instead she sees, unless she’s hallucinating, a horse trailer.
"Oh my god...um, Hayd?"
"Yeah?" He sticks his tongue out the corner of his mouth and tries to accomplish a complicated combo move, he fails.
"Did you um, did you...order anything?"
"I needed new electric razor. Is Amazon here?"
"That's not Amazon..."
Hayden sighs, frustrated. He pauses the game and gets up from the sofa. He walks down the hall to the front door. Deeply confused, he looks outside with his wife.
A man in full denim jumps out of the cab of the trailer and opens the tailgate. Hayden and Jackie watch with abject horror and confusion as one by one, he leads four - FOUR- young horses out of the back. Another man is unpacking saddles, stacking them on the brick walkway.
"WHAT THE FU-"
"HAYDEN.”
"UN-CLE IL-YAS!" The kids begin to chant.
"Mom! He said he'd buy us them and he really did!" Ruby says.
"Who?! Somebody tell me what in the holy name of fuck is going on - I think I'm having an aneurysm," Hayden says while sliding down to a crouching position.
"He said if we promised to name them all after him, he'd buy them for us!” Arthur says, his fists clenched with excitement.
After a few moments to put the pieces together, Jackie begins to laugh. HARD. Soon, she is red faced, bent over at the waist, wheezing a laugh Hayden has never heard before.
"Jax, it's not fucking funny," Hayden says through gritted teeth.
"It really is, though!" She wipes tears from her eyes while Hayden wonders if having four fucking horses delivered to his house was legal grounds for murdering his best friend's husband.
Jackie and the three kids go outside to meet the horses, Hayden stomps back to the living room where he rips his phone off the charger. He stabs at the screen with his finger so hard it hurts.
When Shane answers, he doesn’t give him a chance to speak.
“Hey man, did the kids forge-”
"Your fucking husband bought horses for my kids."
"He…WHAT?"
"HORSES, Shane. As in each of my kids now has a fucking horse and they're all named Uncle Ilya. I swear to GOD this is the last time you're ever babysitting!”
Shane moves the phone away from his ear and looks at it in case it's a prank call. Nope, that’s Hayden’s number, alright. Just at the moment, Ilya strides down the steps into the recessed area in the living room and flops down on the sofa next to him. He’s shirtless in sweatpants slung low on his hips, showing off his mouthwatering V-cut. He sighs and puts his feet up on the coffee table, crossing his ankles.
“Ilya?”
“Mm?”
“You didn’t - you um…”
“HEFUCKINGBOUGHTTHEMFOURFUCKINGHORSESANDONEOFTHEMJUSTFUCKINGSHITONMYDRIVEWAYSHANE!” Shane presses the phone to his chest to muffle Hayden’s voice.
“Did you buy…horses? For Hayden’s kids?”
Ilya smiles and checks his watch. “They’re early.”
Shane groans and puts the phone back to his ear. “Listen, Hayd-”
“Put him on the phone.”
“Hayden, now - calm d-”
“Put him on the fucking phone, Shane!”
Shane holds the phone out to Ilya. “Here.”
Ilya looks at him and cocks his head to one side. “Izvinite? Ya ne govoryu po-angliyski.”
Shane narrows his eyes at his husband. “Yes, you fucking do. Now please un-fuck whatever this situation is.”
Ilya considers saying no, but he winks at Shane and accepts the phone from him. “Hello Hayden, how are you?” His accent is exceptionally thick.
“You sonofabitch what the hell am I supposed to do with four fucking horses?”
“I’m so glad they got there ok,” Ilya responds. “Three brown and one white, yes?”
“Ilya, I’m going to kill you with my bare hands, I shit you not.”
“Yes, yes, you are welcome. My love to Jackie and my little bulochki”.
“Your little bulochki, my ASS!”
“Hayden, Hayden, you sound so stressed,” Ilya’s voice cracks, he can barely contain his laughter. “You just had a long weekend to relax. Tell you what, ask one of the kids if you can take a horse for a little ride.”
Shane has had his face buried in a pillow almost since the first moment of this interaction but now, he’s howling.
“Yes, good, ok, bye-bye.” Ilya hangs up before Hayden can finish his long string of expletives.
He catches Shane's eye and they both lose it. When they can breathe again, Shane rises from where he’s been sitting and he straddles his husband’s hips.
“Hayd’s gonna kill you.”
“Nah. Kids are happy.”
“Where is he supposed to put four horses? The downstairs guest room?”
“No, no. A stable about 30 minutes away will be picking them up at 6. I already paid for the first nine months.”
“You did?” Shane cups the side of Ilya’s face.
“Of course. I enjoy making Hayden crazy but I draw the line at animals being mistreated.”
“What am I gonna do with you?” Ilya pouts, thinking, He’s got a few ideas. “Can’t believe you did that,” Shane kisses him.
“It wasn’t the first plan,” Ilya says, running his hands under Shane’s t-shirt.
“Oh no?” Shane nibbles Ilya’s earlobe.
“No. the girls wanted elephant. Horses were easier to find.”
The next day, the Pikes make the short drive to the Summerdale Stables where Uncle Ilya one-through-four are to live. Jackie speaks with the team of trainers Ilya paid to take care of them and to teach the kids how to ride. She is secretly delighted, having grown up riding but never owned a horse of her own.
Ilya’s phone chimes with a text message. He grins at the photo Hayden sends him of all four kids astride their horses, Jackie is on Amber's horse with her. He replies with a thumbs-up emoji.
Hayden responds with a close-up photo of his left middle finger.