Chapter Text
Ilya Rozanov was a bit of an enigma to Yuna.
He had no discipline, chirped at players like his life depended on it, and laughed in interviews with one-word answers that were barely relevant to the question. But he was good. At hockey, at least. If she had a nickel for every time she started fuming when Rozanov slammed Shane a little too hard against the boards, she’d surely be richer than Shane himself at this point. Rozanov and his sports cars and his women and everything Yuna despised in hockey culture. She must have hated him more than Shane at this point: every time she’d complained about him in her typical fashion (“What a dick! That check was fucking illegal and the Boston refs know it!”), Shane's answer was something along the lines of “Yeah, he’s an asshole,” or an impersonal huffed piece of laughter that was probably for her own benefit.
The first time she had seen humanity in Rozanov was the moment Shane fell, his skull a sickening crunch on the boards, the ice. It hadn’t been audible on the television, but she knew it had been there by the way every player had stopped almost immediately in fear. She’d almost missed it in her panic, her and David scrambling to drive over to Montreal. They had stayed home, something they did only occasionally. They’d invited Shane over for dinner and to stay the night after, but he had said he had plans. Yuna had looked at her husband, a quick glance to see that he was also suspicious, but they didn’t press. If Yuna knew one thing about her son, it was that he was as neurotic about his image as she was anxious about his career. The two of them made quite a pair. She left it alone.
Rozanov had a look, one that Yuna had never seen so clearly on his face before. It gave her pause as she got up to drive to the hospital they surely were taking her son to. It was the same face she was probably making at the thought of Shane being hurt, possibly in a season or career-ending way. It was confusing, seeing that on a face that seemed to automatically rest in a cocky smirk. She didn’t have time to analyze it, however. The medical team had called to tell them that they were taking him to Montreal General, and the head CT results weren’t in yet. She heard the nervousness in the voice of the man on the phone, one that suggested something Yuna wasn’t ready to think about.
As they rushed to the hospital, her mind was only consumed with thoughts of her son. Shane, her miracle baby, Yuna’s blessed boy. She remembered the all-consuming ache of her own infertility and the tears that had soaked David’s shirt after learning the impossibility of it all. It had been a stroke of luck, or maybe divine intervention that had brought Shane into their lives. If that all ended before he even hit thirty…she almost lost it at the thought. David’s eyes found her from the passenger seat when she glanced at him absentmindedly. They were so soft, mushy. She loved him so much, loved the smooth, soft edges he brought to her harsh lines and crashing anxiety. He had been so willing to give up his own family for her, had chosen her over his mother’s rageful prejudice and his father’s disproving glare. He’d taken their comments and grown up and left Alberta when he could. She could never give David his family back, but she’d given him a son. She’d be damned if it all went away in a second.
Yuna’s mind whirred to a stop when David’s hand found her own over the gear shift. Reality flooded back in, halting the spiral of thoughts filling her head with a pressure she wanted to ignore. They had arrived, miraculously considering the state she was in.
The front desk and checking in went by in a blur, Yuna going through the motions with nothing on her mind except Shane. David pulled Yuna into an empty chair in the waiting room and fell into the neighboring one: Shane was being operated on. She didn’t want to think about the implications of an operation, but the doctor that they’d spoken to told them he was relatively stable, just very hurt. Not comforting, but still something. The medical jargon went right over her head, and searching the internet was probably the last thing that would make her feel better. Her phone was almost dead anyways.
Finding Shane’s room after they are informed of the successful surgery is a relief. The nurse bringing them over had a sickly sweet perfume that Yuna hated, just a little. It reminded her of David’s mother and the piercing stare she had received after painstakingly performing perfectly for her, hoping desperately that maybe she would approve. She shook her head and kept walking. She tensed at what she found inside the room.
The bandages almost completely cover the upper half of Shane’s head. He was half-mummy, Yuna thought with a hysterical edge to the worry that had sharpened dramatically at the sight of her son. David’s hand tightened imperceptively in her smaller hand, and she felt the unshakable man she married tremble a little.
After that, days flew by in a haze of shitty coffee and cramped seating. Shane stayed comatose, not having regained consciousness since the accident. Hayden and J.J. visited in between flights to away games, and Yuna watched how two grown hockey players had uncharacteristically shrunk and sat quietly next to her son. It comforted her, at least, to know that Shane had people in his corner. She thought back to nights staying up late speaking with David about the way Shane never talked to other kids in his class, sitting by himself or skating drills individually; and the tantrums he would throw when it was all too much. Shane had grown beyond that since then, or maybe he just hid it better, now. Yuna had the feeling, though, that these two would be by his side nonetheless.
The first time Shane woke up, it was almost nightmarish.
Not at first. At first, Yuna came to, rising out of the doze that had been occupying her mind after the sponsorship emails had become too much. Her eyes found her baby boy absentmindedly, in the way she had been checking on him since the accident. This time, though, his eyes moved. They moved, and so did his fingers. She found it within herself to yell her husband’s name and rush to Shane’s bedside, and slammed the button that called a nurse over. Before she knew it, her vision was blurred and her smile almost hurt from how wide it was. There had always been the fear, the what if, that no one had dared ask of if Shane would ever wake. He’s fine, Yuna could almost scream, He’s awake, he’s fine. He even grinned, grinned, although small, back at her as she caressed his hand. His gaze was unfocused and not completely present, but it was something. Her eyes were so wet and her head so loud she barely noticed David coming from the door with coffee. She saw the shine to his eyes and the huff of relief that exhales from his body, leaving less tension than before.
The air shifts. In between Yuna glancing at her husband and looking back, Shane was different, unseeing. His eyebrows furrowed, lashes fluttering. Was he crying? It all came to a head when Shane started writhing, spitting. The monitors beeped dangerously and Yuna stumbled away from her son. He was clawing at his blankets, trying to grip things that weren’t there. The tubes under his nose were gone in a blur of mindless panic by Shane.
Doctors rushed in the room, voices rising. Yuna was wrenched from her son, and she watched, biting so hard her lip bled, as they sedated him, his thrashes turning into swats and then unconsciousness.
She didn’t sleep very much that night.