Chapter Text
Today was the sort of Saturday that, a decade or so ago, had become the beginning of the rest of Ilya Rozanov’s life.
Thermos of black coffee in hand, he stood in his usual hoodie, track pants, and sneakers from his patch of ice by the benches. In front of him, bodies moved back and forth like waves crashing against the shoreline again, and again.
Suicides, that is what his coach had called them when he was a kid. Then, bag skates when he came to America.
That was probably the better term for this particular exercise, Ilya thought, especially when the bodies executing the drill were no older than twelve.
Ilya took a pull of coffee as his eyes tracked their movements and his ears their desperate panting.
Finally, the shrill relief of the whistle. His whistle.
“Good work,” Ilya barked from the boards. “Five minutes and we scrimmage.”
The sea of black helmets practically nodded in unison. They looked like an army of bobble-heads, or like a forest of saplings the slightest gust might push over.
He loved them with all his heart.
As his team, the Saratoga Storm, skated towards the bench for their well-earned break, Ilya found his assistant coach by the stick rack.
Bill was a decent, hard-working guy. He was older than Ilya by at least a decade and had been a D1 defenseman long ago. Undrafted, but he had never talked about that as if he had wanted to go pro.
Bill was always generous, willing to escort the kids on whatever roadie took them deep into the heart of the Midwest. Ilya had frequently thanked him for his dedicated volunteering during their many seasons working together.
Of course, Bill never did seem to have the courage to remind Ilya that he too was a volunteer of sorts.
Coaching a U12 hockey team was hardly a full-time job for someone who had been one of the most dominant centers in NHL history, let alone a Hall of Famer.
Coaching kids, to Ilya, should have been a hobby at best, or a good bit of pro bono work, a charitable donation for the next generation. However, that relied on Ilya being able to do anything he cared about at less than a hundred percent.
This job had become Ilya’s life slowly and than suddenly, suddenly he had woken up one day and realized he hadn’t had a prolonged conversation with another adult that wasn’t Bill for at least a month.
And no, that was not counting the cashier at his local Dunkin’ Donuts or Stop n’ Shop, or god forbid the parents of the brats he coached.
Ilya didn’t mind this reality, necessarily. Children had always seemed brilliantly simple to him, and even, at times, like his allies and mischievous compatriots.
Throughout his career, he had often been described as child-like or youthful himself, even as he played well into his thirties.
He never quite understood why that was said with such surprise by fans and enemies alike. He still found it astonishing that he had tricked the world into paying him to play a game for a living, to extend this thing he had loved so preciously in childhood into a livelihood.
It hadn’t remained so pure over the years. Not when hockey became an income, both for him and his family, and then a visa, and a green card, and citizenship in this country Ilya now called home.
Then, hockey had become an impediment to the one thing Ilya had ever really, truly wanted.
And, he had chosen hockey. Or rather, he had been given no choice but to choose it.
Hockey had been the key to a series of transactions that had changed Ilya’s life. But it was still a game, and one, against all instincts, he couldn’t help but still love.
He blew the whistle around his neck.
Five minutes of rest went by quickly after a drill as brutal as that one. His kids groaned around him and ditched their water bottle as they skated back onto the ice.
“What is all this?” Ilya admonished. “Are we tired or something?”
One of his braver, more rambunctious kids moaned, “you are killing us, Coach.”
“Child murderer,” Ilya said. “That is a new one for me, I think.”
That got a tired laugh from the pack of bodies surrounding him, albeit a pack he towered over.
Not that they found Ilya Rozanov so intimidating. If only they knew, Ilya often found himself often thinking, how thoroughly they had domesticated him.
“There is no killing, yes?” Ilya said, crossing his arms. “Pain with a purpose. We train to get better, to get stronger.”
The black and blue bobble heads nodded. Their eyes were fixed on Ilya as he spoke.
Ilya would be lying if he said he didn’t love commanding a legion, even if it was one with an average height a little over five feet.
He continued. “Think of all of the boring things you could be doing today, eh?”
His kids grinned through their mouth guards and Ilya felt a pang of fondness in his chest.
It really was this simple to love a thing, at least at this age.
Loving didn’t come with the baggage of what it meant to love, to pour your soul into a thing, or person. That came with plenty of trip wires these children had yet to think about, let alone learn to navigate.
But that wasn’t Ilya’s problem to solve. He was here to teach them hockey.
Five minutes into the scrimmage, The Storm were skating their hearts out. An early two-on-one had led to a clean and well-earned goal and a joyful, shrieking pile on by the net.
The Storm were good, Ilya thought modestly. What he could have said was that they were one of the best U12 teams in North America, at least if records were anything to go by. But apparently he had retired his bragging along with his number when he had left the Raiders, or so he liked to think.
Just as he was about to shout at his top line for that particularly glorious goal, Ilya’s eyes found Bill’s concerned ones.
For a brief moment, Ilya thought something bad had happened.
Always a captain at heart, he immediately ran through his kids in his head. Who could it be and were they ok?
“There’s someone here to see you.”
“It is an emergency?”
“I don’t think so, but—“
Thank god, Ilya found himself thinking reflexively. Not an emergency.
“Then tell them to wait,” Ilya said. “I’m busy.”
Bill looked appalled, as if Ilya was crazy to say such a thing.
Bill rarely if ever disagreed with Ilya—if anything, that was Bill’s problem—and so Ilya knew this had to be serious.
Even after all these years coaching together, Bill was starstruck, was waiting for the day that he woke up from the fantasy of working with the great Ilya Rozanov, who had for some reason or another found himself coaching a youth league in the wastes of upstate New York.
“Bill, what is it?”
“I don’t think you should make him wait, Ilya.”
Him.
Ok, so an angry dad. This dad wouldn’t be the first or last, Ilya reasoned. He was lucky that Saratoga was a town far past its glory days , the days when this part of New York was the industrial heartland of the Northeast. Try coaching in Stamford, Ilya thought with a grimace, and its gaggle of trust fund kids.
“Fine,” Ilya relented. “Give me five and watch the kids.”
Bill nodded gratefully. “He’s by the locker room.”
Ilya stepped onto dry land and ambled down the tunnel. Just as his eyes adjusted to the dim lights that led to the rink’s facilities he caught a figure by the doors.
Then, the man turned and Ilya thought he might be hallucinating.
That man looked exactly like a middle-aged Shane Hollander.
And then, fuck.
That man was Shane Hollander.
And finally, what was Shane Hollander doing here?
The man, Hollander, looked at Ilya warily as if he was quietly assessing Ilya’s threat level.
From the tunnel, Ilya could hear a gleeful round of shrieks, indication of a fresh goal.
For a brief moment, Ilya wondered: if he ran back up the tunnel, would he wake up?
As if that would banish the image of a forty-something-year-old Hollander leaning against the doors from his brain once and for all.
Infuriatingly, the man in front of him seemed to clock his very thoughts.
“If it makes you feel better, you aren’t going crazy, Ilya.”
Hollander went on, with a small smile. “At least, not yet.”
Ilya.
Who did this man think he was? Coming here and calling him by that name.
Only the most decorated hockey player of all time, Ilya thought begrudgingly. It had taken Hollander almost two decades, but he had gotten there eventually.
Hollander looked at him with a frown. “Can we talk?”
Ilya shook his head before he could think better of it. Then, “not here.”
“Ok,” Shane said carefully. “What about out there,” and he pointed back out the tunnel.
Ilya nodded. Sure, that would do, and he swiveled back the way he came, not checking if Hollander was behind him.
By the time they had parked in the stands, his team was practically a live wire.
Glances, gasps. “Was that—”, or, “no fucking way—.”
If Ilya had been more lucid, he would have admonished them for swearing, since apparently their parents had outsourced every aspect of parenting to a grouchy Russian man nearing fifty.
For once, he couldn’t help but feel as shocked as his kids.
Hollander seemed to take it all in stride. Waving affably at The Storm in their oversized pads and helmets.
Ilya stood up and barked at them, “have you forgotten how to skate?”
That seemed to do the trick and the scrimmage continued once more.
“They’re sort of adorable.”
“You will not say that when they beat you,” Ilya said with a shake of his head, exhaling.
“So I’ve heard,” Shane agreed. “What, you had Perez go first round?”
Ilya nodded, realizing with gratitude that he was still clutching his thermos in his hand.
He took a sip. “Perez, yes, and Nikitin the year after.”
Shane nodded. “And now, Moore.” He pointed at the winger currently grappling for the puck against the boards.
“He is very young,” Ilya said reflexively. “He is good, but he needs time. Time without pressure.”
At that word, Ilya frowned at Hollander. Then he really looked at him.
He hadn’t seen this man in a decade, at least. And unsurprisingly he looked like a day hadn’t gone by, if not for a few well-placed frown lines and streaks of gray running through his pitch black hair.
And the suit. The suit was new, along with the quietly confident energy of a man who led the league’s most decorated franchise.
“Why are you here, Hollander?”
Hollander smiled, looking like he had expected that question, like he was surprised it hadn’t come sooner.
Before he could answer, Ilya added, “not scouting, I hope. U12 feels like too much, even for you.”
Hollander ignored the comment. “I’m here to see you, actually.”
“Got bored of managing the Metros? Figured you’d look for a new gig?”
Hollander remained silent as he appraised him.
Ilya continued on, filling the silence with whatever he could find. “I never took you for much of a coach."
“No,” the man beside him agreed. “That was always more your thing.”
Ilya felt his stomach tighten at the familiarity of that line, of their shared history. The atmosphere felt thick with it.
“I’m not good with my words,” Hollander began, “especially with you.” He trailed off, beckoning at Ilya, who, he had to imagine, looked like a wolf with his hackles raised.
Hollander took a deep breath.
“I came here to offer you a job.”
Ilya stood up without even thinking. “That is funny, Hollander. A funny joke.”
“Listen to me, Ilya.”
Hollander plowed onwards. “I am offering you a job, should you want it.”
Ilya wanted to shake Hollander or himself, but tried to suppress that instinct. Whatever dream this was, he had been ready to wake up from it since the moment it had started.
“We have twenty four hours to reach an agreement,” Hollander continued. “It’s a critical year, obviously, and if this isn’t for you, I get it. Trust me, I get—”
Ilya shook his head like he was clearing water from his ears. He liked to think he had been one of the sharper tools in the league, but even he was at a loss.
“Hollander, what are you talking about?”
“Ah, sorry, I’m getting ahead of myself.” He paused. “Coaching, of course.”
What had felt like water in his ears now felt like someone dunking him in a near frozen lake.
Hollander clearly caught his shock, because he slowed down, his deep brown eyes meeting Ilya’s.
“We want to offer you the job. Of head coach.”
He said that last part slowly, like he was administering a particularly vital concussion test.
Ilya felt like he was crazy. Then he remembered Hollander was the crazy one, and always had been.
Geniuses were, weren’t they? Alienated from the world by their excellence.
There had been a time when Ilya thought he was the only person who didn’t find Hollander alien, who actually understood him in some fundamental way.
“You, what, you want me to coach the Montreal Metros?” Ilya said slowly back, almost laughing as he said it. What an odd and strange dream.
“Ilya, I know what you are going to say, and nothing you are going to say is something we haven’t already thought about.”
Ilya couldn’t fathom who the we was in this case, but he held his tongue.
“We don’t care that you haven’t held coaching jobs in the AHL or OHL. That’s actually your appeal.”
Hollander went on. “I’ve seen firsthand how good of an on-ice coach you are. Trust me, I resented it for most of our careers.”
He waved to the ice and Ilya’s kids upon it. “They know better than anyone what you can do.”
Then, “I mean, Ilya, really? Two first round draft picks? In a program that no one had ever heard of until you decided to coach it.”
Ilya just shook his head, covering his face with his hands. He felt the beginning of a headache upon him.
“You really thought we wouldn’t notice?”
Again, with this we.
“Hollander, not everything is about the league. So, no, I didn’t.”
The man beside him nodded. “I know that.”
Ilya was pretty sure he didn’t, but his body still felt like it was in shock, submerged fully in ice water, frozen, and desperately waiting for rescue. He was hardly in a state to argue.
Hollander paused, and then he tried a different strategy. “You mean to tell me you’ve never thought about this? About coaching?”
“I am a coach. I am coaching.”
“U12, sure. But Ilya, what I am talking about—”
“Stop, Hollander.” Ilya opened his arms wide, like he could embrace the image in front of them, of the kids weaving back and forth, the tune of the cut of the their blades against the ice. “This, here. This is enough.”
“You don’t miss it?” Hollander asked him slowly, cautiously. Suspiciously, even.
Ilya frowned, meeting the man’s eyes once more. “No, not for a minute.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I don’t need you to.”
“I know you,” Hollander said. “I know you better—”
“You knew me.”
Hollander shrugged. “The parts of you I knew, those aren’t parts you can change so easily.”
Ilya exhaled a long breath. He was tired.
When had he gotten so tired? Had it been this year, or the year before? Or had it been as early as the first year of his retirement, when he had begun to stare down the rest of his life and hadn’t been so sure he liked what he saw?
“You can’t trick me, Shane.”
Shane.
That was his name after all, and calling a thing by its name made it less powerful, or so his mother always said about the monsters under the bed.
“I’m not tricking you, Ilya. I’m asking you.”
Shane went on. “When they brought me on, I needed convincing too.”
“I’m sure you did,” Ilya said, not believing that for a moment.
“I did, trust me. When I retired, part of that was making my piece with this whole thing. Promising myself the goodbye was real.”
“Until it wasn’t.”
“Until it wasn’t,” Shane agreed. “I don’t regret it. Managing a team, it’s different than playing on one. So different, really. But you know that.”
Ilya nodded. He loved coaching, loved it so much he sometimes wondered if this had really been why he had been put on this earth. Not to score goals, but to motivate other people to score them.
He knew that it probably sounded lame to say his life’s purpose was coaching a bunch of kids. He didn’t care. He had never really cared what people thought of him.
His problem was something else entirely. It was that slow-burning fire within him, somewhere in his chest or stomach. A hearth that had slowly cooled to warm coals over the years, but still let out tell-tale heat.
Heat for competition. Earth-shaking, sweat-pouring competition. The sort of battles that would make most people crumble under the pressure of them, but for whatever reason Ilya had spent the better part of his entire life chasing like a drug.
He hadn’t realized he had tried to quit cold turkey until Shane had found him here, on this spring Saturday, and opened up his palm to offer that drug once more.
Though, looking at Hollander beside him, Ilya wasn’t sure if the drug was hockey, or something else entirely more destructive.
Obviously Ilya would say no. He had done too much good work not to. He had built a life with a beautiful home and only one barely driven sports car in the garage.
He had a dog, for Christ’s sake.
Shane looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “I’m only going to offer this once. Not because you aren’t worth waiting for”—well, that made Ilya’s stomach do all sorts of things—“but because we don’t have time.”
His eyes met Ilya’s. "It’s now or never, Rozanov,” and Ilya could feel Shane exiting the neutral zone, puck in hand.
And then Shane went for the net. It was a simple move, and one which Ilya would look back at months later and grimace at himself for, for such weak defense, for being so easy to read.
It was like it had been for so many years, Hollander always reading his tells before he even realized he had them, always one step ahead.
Shane was a foot from the crease. “Haven’t you ever wondered?”
Ilya frowned.
“What it’s like,” Shane paused, raising his eyes towards Ilya, and with that, his stick.
“What it’s really like to play on the same team? Not some stupid All Stars match.”
He went on. “To compete together, for real.”
And, with that, he swung.
Ilya knew the puck had hit the net without even looking.
“Yes,” Ilya admited.
The words were halfway out of his mouth before he registered them.
Ilya covered his face with his hands. If he was going to drive off the cliff he wasn’t going to watch himself do it.
“Ok,” he muttered, head in hands, in confirmation. “I am listening.”
When he finally looked up, Shane was grinning. It was the face of someone who knew he had won the first match in the series.
“If I had known you would look so annoying—”
“You can’t take that back and you know it.”
Ilya sighed. Shane was probably right.
“So, what would this look like exactly?”
Shane’s brow furrowed and Ilya could see a million plans racing through his brain in an instant.
“We would need to get you to Montreal. Tonight, if possible. And then—”
“Tonight?” Surely Hollander didn’t mean that.
“The draft is next week,” Shane said, as if Ilya had forgotten English. “And a quick search told me you don’t have, ah, a wife, or kids.”
Ilya ignored that last part. “Right, the draft.”
“Obviously management will shoulder most of that. But your input would be critical, and we—”
That we again. Ilya began to tune out what Hollander was saying. He could see the man’s lips moving, his eyes animated and focused. The freckles on the bridge of his nose wandered up and down as he scrunched his nose.
In that moment, Ilya realized he had never really had a choice. Happiness aside, he refused to live with the regret of not knowing where this road might take him, not when the way was laid bare for him.
“Fine,” Ilya interjected, again not clocking what he was saying until the word was halfway out of his mouth.
Shane stopped his rambling. He seemed genuinely surprised. Hopeful, even.
“I just need to know one thing.”
Shane nodded.
“Were there no good coaches in Montreal?”
Shane looked startled, and then he let out a short, sharp laugh.
He shook his head. “We need you, Ilya. I just know it.”
And, for a moment, Ilya could almost pretend that we was an I, even if twenty years late.
He rolled his shoulders back. “If we do this, we do this the right way.”
“I need to tell ownership that you are open to the conversation,” Shane said, frowning in thought. “The rest is easy. We can get a press release out. And obviously there’s your salary—”
“I don’t care about that.”
Shane looked shocked. “As the person who would control your salary, I will pretend you did not just say that to me. And we’ll add getting you an agent to the list.”
“I have an agent, I think,” Ilya said, more to himself than Shane.
Maybe some things about Ilya Rozanov had changed after all. His preferred currency was no longer sports car.
By this point, his kids were by the bench on a water break and Ilya took them in. He felt a pang in his chest, and an itch in the back of his throat as he was overwhelmed by what this would mean.
God, not here. Not in front of Hollander.
He would miss this team. He knew it.
But he had never really had a choice, had he? From the moment he had happened upon Shane Hollander at his rink.
He had had about as much of a choice when a man—a boy, really—had walked up to him outside of a rink in Regina and introduced himself almost thirty years ago.
He couldn’t think about that now, about what he had agreed to then, and again, and in this instance.
He was an old man now, and a lot of life had been lived in between that handshake and the one he was about to give Hollander.
He would handle Bill today, and the kids and parents later.
It had to be what, three hours, to Montreal? He could get to the border before sundown with Anya asleep in a crate in the trunk of his truck.
Shane insisted the rest would be handled, and Ilya believed him. Hollander was a lot of things, but impulsive had never been one of them.
He laughed to himself as he saw the kids clamber over one another, roughhousing as they cooled down after a hard-fought practice.
What would he say at the border?
“I’m here on business,” he supposed.
And the agent would laugh and say, “what business does Ilya Rozanov have in Quebec?”
And he’d shrug and say, “I’ve come to help Shane Hollander win it another Stanley Cup.
He looked at Shane, who caught Ilya’s smile as he ran that particular scenario in his head.
“Something funny?”
“Is there a part of this that isn’t?”
Shane took that in for a moment, before nodding slowly. A small smile stretched across his eternally handsome features.
And, for a moment, Ilya felt the bitter prairie cold and tart smell of cigarette smoke.
Ilya took a deep breath and stuck his hand out for Shane to shake it.
“I’ll see you in Montreal.”