half-assed but determined

After lunch they are seated in the den, fondly flipping through old photograph albums, when Ilya spies one that makes him lean over and squint. In the way of disposable camera film from the early aughts, it is grainy and overexposed, but there are no mistaking the warm brown eyes and pouty lips of Shane Hollander, looking blank faced at the camera. What comes as a surprise are the bleached blond ends of his dark hair, styled into crunchy looking spikes with obscene amounts of product.

Ilya emits a noise that can only be described as a squawk. Hand clapped to his mouth, because he barely trusts himself to speak, he chokes out, "What is...this?"

Yuna glances over nonchalantly. "Oh, that. Shane begged me to let him get frosted tips when he was 12."

Ilya will die. He will die right here, gagging on suppressed laughter, and Yuna will be forced to clean the mess of his remains off the berber carpet.

"I think he was trying to emulate some boy band he was obsessed with then. NSYNC maybe? I thought it was a bad idea, but David convinced me to let him try it out. Shane was going through a moody period, and he thought it might help."

"And-" Ilya squeaks in way too high a pitch, then clears his throat. "Ahem. And did it?"

Yuna thinks. "Hard to say. God, he was a bit of a bitchy preteen." She chuckles. "He had a poster of Lance Bass taped to his closet door. In hindsight, I should have guessed the gay thing much earlier."

Ilya can no longer contain his laughter. He doubles over with it, waving his hand and wheezing, "Sorry, sorry." He wipes tears from his eyes. "I can have this picture?"

Yuna shrugs. "Sure. The poster is probably still upstairs in his closet, if you want that, too. I've been meaning to clear it out-"

We don’t talk about this enough. With all the big romantic gestures in The Long Game, this, to me, is one of the most romantic moments.

We know Ilya isn’t a fan of Shane’s restrictive diet. He teases him about it, but Ilya is an expert ragebaiter who knows how to tease the people he cares about when they feel safe and in ways that never really hurt.

Shane is “frantic” in this scene. Ilya has the perfect opening to say something about his diet, and he doesn’t take it. He sees that Shane is panicking, steps in and fixes it. He was looking at that menu thinking about Shane and Shane’s fuckass diet that Ilya doesn’t even like. But he knows this is important to Shane. He knows Shane is already nervous about being on a date with Ilya in public and being with another queer couple. So he meets Shane’s needs without Shane ever having to ask, and he does it quietly, without drawing any attention, so that Shane can save face.

Of course he’s gonna tease him about it a little bit later because that’s what they do. But he only does that AFTER Shane’s had a chance to catch his breath and feel safe again.

|| The Brécourt Manor Assault (6 June 1944)||

“When he landed, he assembled his command, and it was a widespread drop. But Winters was able by D-Day morning to gather 12 men, and he was ordered to destroy a German artillery battery that was firing on Utah Beach, one of the two American beaches. It was a 50-man German battery and he had 12 men, and by fire and maneuver, by leading his men from the front, he was able to knock out each of those guns on Utah Beach. And what a difference that made, by silencing those guns, the American Army suffered 192 dead on Utah Beach, in sharp contrast to Omaha Beach — where Americans suffered over 2,500 casualties.”

After a while of talking about how Anya acts the trainer says there’s nothing to worry about, Anya likes Shane just fine, it’s just that she sees him as the boss and is acting accordingly

And Ilya is like. But. I’m the one who adopted her? And raised her before Shane got here?? And the trainer is just like yeah well she sees you more like an equal. And Ilya is like WAIT she thinks Shane is in charge of both of us?? And the trainer is just like well do you interact in a way that would make her think that?

Ilya’s life flashes before his eyes as he thinks of all the times Shane has come over with a snack for Ilya and a treat for Anya, or all the times Shane has announced they’re all going for an after dinner walk, or pets Ilya’s hair and tells him he did a good job at practice, or the fact that he uses the same warning tone with Anya when she misbehaves as he does with Ilya when he’s causing problems on purpose