When My Rival Cries

Synopsis

After a brutal on-ice collision leaves Ezra Thornton concussed and hospitalized with a fractured collarbone, his secret lover of seven years, Ashport Mammoths star Sasha Yelchi, panics. Rushing to the hospital against all logic, Sasha bursts into Ezra's room without checking who else might be there. But it was too late. Ezra's parents, Arthur and Hana Thornton, and his best friend Wes Drummond are all standing by the bed. Ezra, high on painkillers and stripped of inhibition, reaches for Sasha with a broken "Come here. Please?" Sasha, terrified, climbs onto the bed and holds him, tenderly and intimately, in full view of everyone. Arthur reads the room first, nodding silently at Sasha before ushering the stunned Hana and Wes outside. Alone, Ezra begs Sasha not to leave. He asks him to spend the summer at the family cottage in Arcadia, to swim, to be lazy, to just be "normal boys" for once, hidden away from the PHL spotlight. Sasha, overwhelmed, breaks down crying. He's never felt this wanted. His mother died when he was a child; his father Viktor was cruel before his death; his brother is estranged. He has no family, until Hana Thornton follows him into the hospital hallway, learns to pronounce his name properly, and holds him while he sobs about finding his mother's body and seeing Ezra motionless on the ice. Then she pulls out her phone and saves him under the name Ezra has always used: Fern. That night, Sasha's roommate Gagnon presses him for the truth. Sasha can't reveal everything, but he shares enough about his mother and the flashback. Gagnon doesn't ask more questions. He just hugs him. And for the first time in years, Sasha lets someone hold him while he falls apart.