“Geno? Are you okay? Physically,” Sid asks, which is good, because Zhenya doesn’t think he can put into words how he’s feeling emotionally. He imagines saying, The person I’ve loved for ten years finally took me to bed last night, but it turns out he didn’t want to, and now I can read his mind. No, thank you. “Feel fine,” Zhenya answers. “Even head feel fine.” And suddenly he realizes how fucking odd that is: he was concussed, and the room is brightly lit – he should be hiding under a blanket right now. He narrows his eyes and asks, “Sid, why head feel fine? What happen to concussion?” Sid takes a halting step closer to the bed and says, “Our bond, it’s—it’s a healing bond.” “Holy mother of God,” Zhenya breathes. So. They’re definitely not breaking the bond, then.

“So I say, before I’m thinking through, I say am getting married,” Geno says and glances up at Sid and then back down again. “They say to American?” Geno seems reluctant to continue. Sid’s stuck on trying to figure out who Geno is marrying and why he didn’t tell Sid about it. “I say, ‘no, to Canadian.'” Sid makes a face. Because seriously, Sid feels like he would’ve heard if Geno was dating someone that seriously. But then again, he had no idea Geno had a kid until he was sitting in a hotel room in fucking Finland. “Who?” Sid finally asks when Geno seems like he’s not going to continue. Geno takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “You.” “Me what?” Sid asks stupidly. or The summer Russia invaded Ukraine and Geno had to marry Sid: a love story.