#ranskov

of course!!!

RANSKOV

tater swings by the haus for pong, lardo is like rans you have to partner with me in pong and rans is like okay and she's like you CANNOT back out and he's like okay???

and then he sees their opponent is tater (and holster but ransom sees holster every day) and he's like oh god and lardo's like no backing out i told you.

SO they play pong which breaks the ice and they fall in LOVE.

rans and tater follow each other on instagram (ransom is having heart palpitations) and jack accidentally plays cupid and bitty, lardo, and holster intentionally play cupid (bitty has a lot to do with jack's role in the whole thing)

tater thinks hockey shit is the greatest thing on earth and is INSTRUMENTAL in getting ransom and holster the capital to get a youtube channel up and running. (he's also the one who convinces them to do it in the first place. ransom is immediately in. 

holster is like ...............yeah okay running a youtube channel with the intent of getting money from it is close enough to soulless econ major recent grad work that i'll take it. (that's not what he says but it's close enough. holster talks a big game when it comes to ransom making the world a better place with his brain, but he himself is much more of a 'just let me earn some money and retire' kind of guy.) 

also, he agrees for the cause of ransom and tater's love

they wind up filming a backlog of their previous hockey shit episodes while they're coming up with material for their next episodes and they do, in fact, have a clip of tater talking to reporters in there. (they also convince jack to reenact his conversation with ford, complete with jack literally changing into his uniform and then ransom adding a thoughtfully placed jump cut. ways of convincing jack to do it included: 'it'll take like 5 minutes', 'tater will be sad if you don't', and 'you get to talk about bitty')

there's also several clips of noted american hockey players saying 'eh' in interviews for the 'spontaneous canadian accent' part

when they post the hockey speak one tater tweets about it and it's an instant classic

ransom and holster also do a very serious episode about how pie and jam are a newly developing part of hockey culture. it's a collab with bitty in bitty and jack's apartment, featuring many falconers discussing their love for baked goods, the whole rumor mill about black market pie trading (poots looks mildly to severely uncomfortable for this entire part), and many segments where ransom and holster are just trying to talk to bitty and tater keeps yelling about blueberries from wherever he happens to be in jack and bitty's apartment.

yes he sticks around for the entire filming of this episode. let him live he just wants to wait for bitty to inevitably bake something and also gaze at ransom's beautiful face in peace

anyway the youtube channel is a career but also totally an excuse for ransom and tater to talk to each other all the time (tater is the 'nhl correspondent' which really means he and rans talk all the time and occasionally tater mentions something that ransom thinks he and holster could do a video on)

holster, by the way, is exhausted at this point and thinks the squad (him, lardo, bitty, and, without his knowledge, jack) need to do something more drastic to get them to actually talk to each other about their feelings which is how haus 2.0 (minus that one roommate) winds up being invited to providence for a weekend. yes shitty's in on it now he's delighted

what follows is a full weekend of shenanigans fully designed to keep forcing ransom and tater together until one of them says something. notable events include a hike in the park in which everyone subtly pulls ahead until ransom and tater are trailing the group by like. 30 feet. putting on a rom com for a movie night and then everyone gradually disappearing until just ransom and tater are the only ones actually watching the movie. more beer pong just because. bitty makes blueberry crumble secretly while jack is (unwittingly) distracting tater via hanging out in the living room, then is like HEY RANSOM HELP ME WITH SOMETHING, immediately followed by JACK HONEY COULD YOU GIVE ME A HAND WITH SMTH. ransom arrives in the kitchen. jack arrives in the kitchen, leaving tater alone in the living room. bitty sends ransom to the living room with blueberry crumble for tater and is like  oh jack i just wanted to see your face :)

at which point jack is like bits what the fuck is going on so bitty relates the entire thing to him in a whisper and jack's like omg. do you know what you need to do and bitty's like no????

and jack is like you need to do. what bad bob did. (he doesn't actually refer to his father as bad bob but u see where i'm going with this)

and bitty's like okay but how and jack's like i got it dw about it and bitty's like okay??? and so the next morning jack recruits tater to go grocery shopping with him and while they're grocery shopping he's like Hey Tater. You Know What Would Be Cool. and tater's like what and jack's like you not letting all of them go back to boston without saying something and tater's like >.> what do you know

meanwhile. lardo, bitty, shitty, and holster are ganging up on ransom to convince him that actually, tater isn't out of his league, and that tater goes to such lengths to interact with ransom that isn't it within the realm of possibility that tater is interested in him too? wouldn't that make sense justin??? (holster has utilized his econ powers to make a spreadsheet. he pulls it out and ransom is like fuck i can't argue with excel)

by the time jack and tater get back with groceries both tater and ransom are 100% determined to not let the weekend end without saying something so of COURSE bitty's like hmmmmmm. i think i'll make something complicated with a lot of ingredients we don't have for dinner. i'm gonna need three pairs of hands so lardo and holster can come with me

and then as soon as they're out the door jack is like hey shitty i just finished this cool book you might like it let's go talk about it and shitty's like YES i would love to see this book. oh it's not in the living room you say??? well that is fine with me let's go see this book and they vanish

and then both ransom and tater are like MY TIME HAS COME and they lowkey just blurt it out at the same time because their ability to be smooth has been pretty incapacitated

ransom gets tater to wear salmon shorts (and holster is almost incoherent with rage)

ransom used to like blueberries but now they make him happy because they remind him of tater (sometimes it's kind of a bittersweet happiness if they haven't seen each other in a while honestly, but once shitty graduates from law school it's easy enough for haus 2.0 to pick up and relocate to providence, aided by the money from ransom and holster's channel)

tater ALMOST gets re-nicknamed dopey when ransom visits the falcs once, just because of the dopey grin on his face, but it doesn't stick (thirdy is sad about this. he really tried)

ransom and bitty with the other SOAPs at games going absolutely FERAL

ransom is big enough that if he wears enough of tater's falcs issued workout gear in public he starts to get looks as people mentally run through the falcs' roster to figure out which one he is because he looks SO familiar and he's wearing all that gear he must be a falconer right???

turns out he looks familiar because hockey shit is becoming a cultural cornerstone (right along with pies) of hockey and he's wearing all of that gear because of his nhl boyfriend but you know. i'm terrible with faces so this would be me

tater seeks holster out to ask what the best way is to support ransom when he's going through it (there are better terms but my brain will Not let me think of them)

'affectionate wrestling' is kind of the name of the game here

Holster: okay i’ve always thought i was straight but u know what i’m okay with this turn of events lets date. 

Ransom: what.

Ransom:

he went from this 

locking himself in the attic, barely able to speak to tater

to this