Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. A user equipment (UE) may receive, within a subframe, a plurality of sidelink control channel signals providing scheduling information for a plurality of sidelink shared channel signals that are also received within the subframe. The UE may determine to use one or more of the plurality of sidelink control channel signals as pilot signals for decoding the plurality of sidelink shared channel signals. The UE may decode the plurality of sidelink shared channel signals based at least in part on the plurality of sidelink control channel signals as pilot signals.