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It’s around four in the morning when Shane wakes up with a strangled gasp, bleary eyed and trying to claw his way to consciousness, fingers grappling desperately within his confines to remove the weighted blanket that has wrapped around his body during the night.
Normally, he would find the warm, dense blanket comforting. However, right now all it feels like is that he’s stuck in the clutches of a snake tightening its coiled shape around him.
He’s panting with the exertion of fighting to find an edge, any edge, of the blanket to begin his escape, when suddenly there are large and warm hands resting on his covered shoulders.
Shane goes limp, permitting the reassuring hands to begin his extraction much more efficiently than his own pitiful attempt.
He’s still breathing shallowly when he feels the initial release of the blanket’s grasp, which in turn allows his breaths to come a little easier. The slow, methodical release of the weight around his body is its own weird sort of comfort, and every additional inch he is able to wiggle around in brings back a calmness to his mind.
Shane is being coaxed onto his side with gentle touches, sighing when he is finally able to draw in a full breath.
His breath is immediately replaced by a gasp as he keeps rotating, like a rug being unraveled, spinning and spinning as he ends up at the complete other side of the bed. He ends up laying on his stomach, whipping his gaze towards the direction he just rolled from where he hears booming laughter rising in volume.
“Hey!” Shane exclaims, fighting off a small laugh of his own.
“I am sorry, moya lyubov, it was the fast way to do this.”
Ilya is grinning at him, not looking sorry in the slightest.
Shane crawls towards Ilya, shaking his head fondly in exasperation at the antics of his fiancé.
Fiancé.
Shane catches himself sometimes still unbelieving that he is going to marry Ilya Rozanov one day, but here he is, sharing a bed with him while they enjoy their off season at his cottage.
Shane finishes his short journey back towards Ilya, who is sitting with his arms open, waiting for Shane to fall into them.
Who is Shane to deny that invitation?
He wraps his arms around a thick waist, cuddling in closer to Ilya as he wraps his strong arms around Shane. Where the blanket had felt constricting and suffocating, now that he is resting in the arms of the man he loves he feels nothing but a warm comfort settle into his entire being.
“How you get so wrapped up like pelmeni, hm?” Ilya asks quietly, rocking his body back and forth while he readjusts Shane more comfortably in his hold.
“Are pelmeni those dumpling things you were telling me about?” Shane questions, not appreciating the comparison.
“Da.” Ilya answers with a smile on his face.
Shane rolls his eyes affectionately, before turning around in Ilya’s arms to face him.
“I must have been moving a lot while I was sleeping. I didn’t realize I was wrapped up like that until I woke up and was struggling to breathe.” Shane admits sheepishly.
“I know you like this blanket, but maybe we get rid of it.” Ilya says seriously.
“It’s a weighted blanket. It’s supposed to help me sleep. This was just like, I don’t know, a freak accident or something.” Shane tries to reason.
“Oh, so you need this weighted blanket to help you sleep?”
Ilya has a look in his eye that Shane immediately recognizes as mischief.
“Yes…” Shane trails off, his anticipation building as he waits to hear what Ilya will say next.
“Then I will be weighted blanket.”
Shane feels an astonished laugh break free from his throat, before it quiets at the silence he gets in response. He doesn’t hear an accompanying laugh from the other man, instead he sees another layer beyond the mischievousness in his eyes, something that tells him Ilya is being dead serious.
“Are you serious?” He asks, just to confirm his suspicions.
“Sweetheart, this blanket tried to kill you. Is lucky I have not thrown it out of cottage.”
“It’s just a blanket! It didn’t try to do anything!” Shane isn’t sure why he is arguing this right now, but he truly does enjoy sleeping with his weighted blanket. It typically helps ground him and assist with his anxiety he sometimes feels at the end of a long day. Tonight was just a crazy fluke.
“No, I fight it off you, I know what it was trying to do. Evil blanket tries to kill you.”
Shane just laughs at this ridiculous man.
“Fine, whatever. I’ll go put it in the closet or something.”
Shane makes a move to do just that, before being stopped by Ilya tightening his arms around him. He finds himself suddenly pushed down towards the bed, laying against the pillow that Ilya was using through the night that smells like him, a mix of the shampoo Shane keeps in his bathroom and something that is just innately Ilya. Shane is burying his face in the pillow and taking a deep breath in before he can stop himself.
He slowly realizes what he is doing, and forces himself to lift his head from the pillow, hoping Ilya didn’t see.
He shouldn’t have been concerned, as he watches the other man walking around the bed towards the other side where the weighted blanket ended up. He must not have noticed Ilya leaving the bed while he was sniffing his pillow like a weirdo.
“What are you doing?” Shane asks.
“Throwing this evil blanket away.”
“No, Ilya! I can donate it or something, don’t throw it away!” Shane giggles, reaching out towards one corner of the blanket to pull it back towards himself and away from where Ilya is fast approaching.
“Oh, donate this so it can kill more? How nice of you, Canada’s golden boy Shane Hollander who gives murder blanket to children."
Shane is outright laughing now, still trying to pull the blanket away from the other man quite unsuccessfully.
“No! A child can’t use this anyway, there are weight requirements and stuff for safety!”
“Seems to me there is too much safety involved for stupid blanket.” Ilya says as he heaves the blanket towards himself.
The latest tug on the blanket pulls Shane closer to Ilya, dragging him slightly across the bed from where he remains tethered to the blanket in his battle to wrench it from the other man.
“Just let me fold it, we can figure out what to do with it in the morning.” Shane says as he tries to sit up to get some form of leverage in this tug of war.
“Is already morning and I say it needs to go.” Ilya declares, using the moment Shane is trying to sit up as an opportunity to drag the blanket almost a whole foot closer to himself. This also forces Shane to be hauled along, falling over again and sprawling out across the bed.
“Stop pulling me!” Shane yells, laughter fresh on his lips as he tries to fight his smile away.
“Is not me, is blanket. Is why it must go, it cannot help but be putting you in danger.” Ilya is laughing now too, grin firmly in place. He gives another voracious yank, pulling both the blanket and Shane the remaining distance across the bed.
Shane looks up at Ilya from his place on the bed, watching the smile turn into a wicked grin on the other man’s handsome face. Even in the early hours of the morning, sweating slightly from the exertion of pulling a 200 pound man across a king sized bed, he is gorgeous.
“Hi.” Shane says, feeling oddly shy.
Ilya’s eyes soften, smile still in place, as he lets the blanket finally drop from his grasp, spilling onto the ground.
“Hello, myshonok.”
Shane feels his cheeks begin to redden at the easy affection in Ilya’s voice, full of endearment and tenderness.
Shane rises to sit on his knees, gazing up at Ilya with pure love in his eyes. He reaches his arms up, wiggling his fingers, and watches as Ilya gets the hint and lowers himself for Shane to wrap his arms around his shoulders. Ilya’s hands settle themselves low on Shane’s back, thumbs fitting into the small dimples that Shane knows Ilya is obsessed with.
Shane turns his head slightly so his mouth is right next to Ilya’s ear, whispering, “Thank you for protecting me.”
Shane hopes Ilya can tell he isn’t only talking about saving him from the weighted blanket.
Judging by the small breath followed by a tremulous gulp, the other man understood the words that Shane did not fully speak.
“Always, sweetheart. Always.”
The hands on Shane tighten reflexively, little pulses of connection, and he leans his head back just enough to unite with Ilya in a sweet kiss.
The sweetness lasts only a moment, developing into a steady press of lips as Shane slides his hands up into Ilya’s hair, firmly gripping the soft curls he could look at forever.
Shane tightens his hold in surprise and lets out a small noise of shock against the other man’s mouth as he feels himself tilted backwards, trying to gain purchase against Ilya who is following him down, down, down, before settling above him from where they are now laying together on the bed.
Shane spreads his legs to more comfortably accommodate the larger man above him.
Lips still touching lightly, Shane feels more than hears the huff of breath Ilya releases.
He can’t resist locking eyes with the other, melting into a puddle of goo at the reverence he sees reflected in them. Staring into each other’s eyes, where Shane used to become uncomfortable with how close he was to Ilya due to the magnitude of his feelings before he knew how to process them, all he feels now is adoration.
“I love you.” Shane can’t help but verbalize.
“Ya tebya lyublyu.” Ilya returns the sentiment.
They trade kisses for a moment more, Shane wiggling happily against the figure over his, when Ilya suddenly breaks their kiss just as it was beginning to deepen.
Shane makes a questioning noise, trying to pull Ilya back towards him to continue, when he notices the smirk that is steadily growing on his face.
“What?” Shane asks.
“Is nothing serious. Just…”
“What is more important than kissing me right now?” Shane puts on his best pleading eyes, hoping it will bring Ilya back to the previous task at hand.
Ilya placates him with a quick peck against his lips, but Shane can still feel the shape of his smirk as he does it.
“I just was thinking, like this, is like I am your weighted blanket now, yes?”
Shane stares incredulously up at the other man.
He’s not wrong, Shane supposes, but then another thought pops into his head.
“Ilya, you are ridiculous.”
“What you mean?”
Shane cannot believe this is the man he will spend the rest of his life with.
“You are jealous of a blanket!”
Ilya looks away, caught.
“Unbelievable. Is that why you want to get rid of it?”
“No. I want to get rid of it because it tries to kill you.”
Shane just stares at him, silently waiting for him to continue.
Ilya has always been weak to Shane’s eyes, so when he speaks again, it is only slightly more defensive.
“I can do better job at comforting you and keeping you warm. I would never try to murder you in sleep. Why you need this evil blanket and not me?”
The whole time Ilya was talking, Shane could feel a smile beginning to grow from the corners of his mouth, until he could no longer fight the stretch and his teeth began to show. He knows his cheeks are pleasantly pink and he can feel his heart thumping in his chest.
Oh does he love this ridiculous man.
He notices that the tips of Ilya’s ears are a faint pink, seemingly embarrassed at how seriously he is feeling about this situation.
“Ilya.”
Ilya slowly drags his eyes back towards Shane from where they had drifted away.
“I love you.”
Ilya nods.
“You know, for everything this weighted blanket does for me, there is a long list of things it will never be able to do.”
Shane brings both of his hands up to grip Ilya’s cheeks, ensuring that he remains looking at him.
“This dumb blanket will never kiss me good morning to make sure I start my day happy. It will never buy the very specific groceries I include on my list that I know are sometimes hard to find. It doesn’t send me pictures of cute dogs just because it was thinking about me.” Shane feels himself smile, before he goes on.
“It will never run me a bath to sooth my aching muscles, it won’t comfort me after a loss or celebrate a win with me, and it certainly will never ever do that thing with your tongue that makes me see stars.”
That finally startles a laugh out of Ilya, shaking his head in exasperation while Shane can see the tears that have steadily built in his eyes balance precariously on his waterline.
Shane tightens his grip on Ilya, putting as much emotion into his next words as he is capable of, making sure Ilya will feel every single one as Shane intends, down to his bones.
“This blanket will never love me the way you do, the way you make sure I feel so wholly loved every single day of my life.”
Shane watches the tears finally spill onto Ilya’s cheeks, gently moving his thumbs to intercept them on their descent.
“How could you ever believe for a single second there was any competition?”
“Oh, Shane.” Ilya sobs out, taking a gasping breath in before leaning down to bury his face in Shane’s neck.
“You mean more to me than any stupid blanket, more than any single possession I could ever have in my life. You are my life, Ilya.”
Shane feels his own tears begin to cascade down his face, bringing his hands away from Ilya’s face in order to wrap them fully around him in a hug.
Ilya pulls back slightly, making sure Shane is looking at him, as he speaks with conviction.
“Ya lyublyu tebya vsem serdtsem, vsey dushoyu.”
Ilya leans down to give him a quick kiss, pulling back only to say more words in Russian that Shane can’t understand but can feel in his soul.
“Ya ne mogu zhit’ bez tebya.”
Shane meets Ilya halfway on the next kiss, their wet cheeks touching and spreading their tears between them.
Shane thinks that should be somewhat gross, but it just endears him even more as he deepens the kiss, opening his mouth for Ilya to softly caress his tongue with his own. Shane feels a flicker of heat in his belly at the feeling of the other man’s tears on his cheek and spit in his mouth. He wants to be covered by Ilya completely.
Shane lets out a soft sigh as Ilya pulls back, very reluctantly allowing it, while he feels his chin grasped in a strong grip between a finger and thumb.
“This means we get rid of the blanket today, yes?”
Shane truly can’t fight the smile that splits onto his face at the menace before him.
“Oh my god, Ilya. Yes, we can get rid of the blanket.”
Ilya has a matching grin spring to his face, a smug look in his eyes Shane has seen plenty of times before when he is on the ice after beating him at a game.
The eyes of a winner.
Shane finds himself both exasperated and fond as he sets his own eyes in a determined look up at Ilya.
“After you make it up to me. Repeatedly. And thoroughly.” Shane states with no room for argument.
“Now this I can do.”
As Ilya launches himself back towards Shane and the feeling of kisses peppering against his throat grows stronger, Shane is confident that he will never need another weighted blanket to help him sleep through the night.
He has his very own Ilya Rozanov by his side, forever and always.