Author's note: « But Let It Go, And You Learn » arc as always with my Russia/Hungary fics and most of my Russia stuff. I just have a lot of very specific Russia headcanon that was all put into that. Also I really love them.

I'm going to be posting my source notes for this on my LJ, especially since I like my modern Russia stories politically relevant (I'd say accurate but I'm still American and an Ivan fangirl and do what I want). I need to get better about posting things on LJ though; if you have a LJ too feel free to friend me and then maybe that will motivate me more? We'll see. Maybe if I could find more Russia fics I like that would motivate me (as he stares at me from my desktop).

Also rereading this I really love this fic so much. All the Russia/Hungary.

Enthusiasm Optional

For a country who's male life expectancy spent a lot of time at or under sixty years of age recently, Ivan Braginski has survived seeing a lot of shit go down. For a country who's male life expectancy is still only around seventy, he really shouldn't be smoking his fifth cigarette of the day. But eh, he's yet to die so far.

It's cold. No, fucking cold. No, beyond fucking cold, not that Ivan's really noticed; he'd spent far too much time banished in Siberia to really care that much when he returned to civilization. But when the reporters call back to their foreign desks in their international offices, they'll including in their reports just to flush out the stories of protests and political unrest that it's cold in Moscow. As if that's a surprise.

Where he feels it though is in his heart, as solid and frozen through as some of his most northern lands before global warming started thawing them out. Some weeks Ivan forgets to thaw his heart, letting it go black and fester with disease until he gets a call or a text or an email, a reminder that brings him back to earth, grounding him in reality. But Ivan still feels it in his heart, despite the warmth in his lungs spreading from the cigarette between his fingers. Part of his heart is frozen through and it'll just never thaw out. The journalists should write about that. Idiots.

Leaning against the bridge and taking in the view, she sticks out like a sore thumb as she approaches him. Not that that's her fault; no, Ivan fully blames himself for how poorly she blends in in Russia among the Muscovites. Winters in Nizhny had been different than here in Moscow, and he'd tried to pamper and protect the Hungarian nation as much as he could back then. Now he lets her walk to him, puffing on his cigarette. In his inner pocket he can feel the vibration of his phone from a text; he could deal with it later.

She needs a thicker hat he decides as Erzsi gets close enough for him to work out the details of her body, taking one last puff of his cigarette. He closes his eyes, savoring the deadly toxins and dropping the stub to the ground to stomp on it the way he'd like to stomp on several politicians' faces. She needs a thicker hat, and more fashionable winter boots, and is that one of those scarves from Francis? He'd need to one-up the Frenchie with a gift of his own that could sit so close to her face and that beautiful mouth of hers.

"Hello," she offers breathlessly, visibly shivering as she shoves her hands further into her pockets. Thicker gloves, Ivan adds to the list as he wraps his arms around Erzsi, pulling her to him. Normally her arms would wrap around him too, holding his middle that's thinned out considerably since his sisters left. His jacket is less puffy than hers; another thing for the list, because her coat just screams, "I am not Russian and I never will be".

Ivan kisses Erzsi's forehead, his hands coming up to hold her head to his chest. He kisses her head again, holding her tighter, letting the warmth of his body warm hers and her warmth warm his heart.

Definitely should have thawed out his heart a bit more this week.

In the apartment he's already got the heat on full blast and the tea done. "Thanks," Erzsi sighs as Russian hands slip the coat from her Hungarian body just inside the door. "I guess I'll never get used to winters here," she adds with a touch of playfulness in her voice, rubbing her cold hands together.

Silently Ivan takes the hands in his and rubs them himself, puffing hot air on them a couple of times. At first the Russian bends for the shorter woman, but by the time he's done he's standing fully erect, Hungarian hands stretched above Erzsi's blushing face as his lips ghost her knuckles.

She smiles, wide, almost sadly, and so Ivan pulls her to him in a crushing kiss that's meant to say the thousands of things he's just too fucking tired to express, the things she knows weigh heavy on him just as they did before the collapse. His fingers pull at her hair as her hands yank at the neck of his sweater, noses banging and tongues dueling for supremacy. He's desperate, for her, for answers, for just one fucking decade of good things to be followed by another. And Erzsi moves against the Russian understanding all of that, finally giving in and letting him take all he wants.

Actually, upon closer inspection, the boots are fine, probably look beautiful with the winter coat Erzsi wears in Budapest, her hair left down as she walks through her ancient capital. But Ivan hadn't paid the boots that much attention as he'd pried them off her feet now situated in his lap, being massaged. The Hungarian nation's head is over the end of the couch, the woman mewling and moaning as her lover finds certain spots that need attention and other spots that always require work, his thumbs working the muscles. She wiggles her toes in delight.

"When you're ready," the smaller nation whispers in Russian, and Ivan stills for a moment at that; there's a long pause before Erzsi finishes the thought with, "I'm ready," and so he goes back to what he had been doing.

He isn't ready. Not quite yet.

Since Ivan cooked dinner Erzsi cleans up, scrubbing happily away in the kitchen. The table is too small as he sits at it waiting for her, his legs stretched out. The whole apartment is too small, for a man of his size, and he fucking hates it, the water turning off behind him.

Ivan used to have a big house that was filled with life, other nations, and it's not that he misses the control, the communist era, but rather that he just misses the camaraderie, the someone else being in the house.

Ivan still has the house, but it's not the same when the damn thing is empty.

"Hey," a voice says suddenly in his ear, two hands running down his hard chest to find the smooth skin beneath as her fingers pull at the bottom of his shirt. Erzsi kisses the back of the Russian's head before sitting beside him. "Don't you have work tomorrow?"

He shakes his head.

"Day after that?" she offers.

He shakes his head again.

"Vanya," Erzsi starts, slightly exasperated and perhaps a little panicked, "please, say something. I don't like it when you get in these moods."

He crooks an eyebrow.

The Hungarian rolls her eyes in what he presumes to be an attempt at remaining calm. "This is what it was like, after I came to live with you. At first you were nice but then you got really quiet and that was scary, Vanya. It was awful, like waiting for the inevitable bomb to go off. So please, Vanya, say something. Tell me what happened that I had to suddenly come out here, for you, to be with you, my big Russian goof-" she smiles bittersweetly and it breaks his heart "-because I don't understand. This isn't like you Vanya; what happened?"

He sighs, one hand reaching out to pull a letter forward, into his line of vision. After a moment Ivan makes up his mind, handing it to Erzsi and looking out the window before turning back to his sweet lover.

She's still visibly upset he isn't speaking but as her eyes take in the letter, her face growing in a mixture of surprise and horror and disgust, the other nation's anger moves off of him to the letter's writer.

"Those bastards," she whispers. "Those mother fucking bastards. Can they do this? Can they really do this?" She's almost crumpling the letter, she's holding it so tightly, so Ivan pries it from her hands, smoothing it out and putting it back in the envelope. The Russian tucks it back among his papers because he'll need this letter for future reference. "You're the best among us, they can't do this, you've been the most loyal nation for so long despite everything they've put your through! What they asked of you!" By this point the Hungarian is so worked up, leaning dangerously towards him, her hands grabbing his clothing, his limbs, his face, just for something to keep them grounded. "Ivan Braginski, can they really fire you? Tell me they can't. You're- You are Russia!"

He sighs, taking her wrists into his hands to calm her. "Not any longer Erzsi."

When she starts to cry Ivan pulls her to his chest, holding his lover close as sobs rack her body.

She's so beautiful as she lays under one of his arms, the moonlight and streetlight streaming in through the window. Ivan's back is propped up on the headboard, a tumbler of vodka in one hand and a cigarette in the other, both testaments to how bad the situation is that Erzsi is letting him have his two favorite poisons, in bed, while she sleeps no less.

She's so much more beautiful than he deserves, her one cheek pressed into his chest, her eyes closed, her breathing slowed after their fit of passion and rounds of love making. The Hungarian's arms are wrapped around him, long hair flowing over both their bodies. One of Ivan's hands is drifting up and down her bare back, fingers ghosting lines on the pale, soft flesh as he watches her sleep.

Taking a drag on his cigarette, the Russian allows his eyes to drift closed for just a moment, breathing deeply. Fuck he wishes this was easier; if just loving Erzsi, and being able to be with her, was easier then the rest wouldn't be so bad. But no, his country's fucked up all the possible relations he's ever had and Ivan counts himself lucky anyone still talks to him.

There was Timo, whom he got along with just fine, until the revolution and then the two wars. Berwald has a restraining order out on the Russian now.

And there was Irina, whom Ivan loves so much, his big sister who always cared for him. She's legally not allowed to contact him anymore.

Nata could have been a beautiful woman; he'll never forgive himself for how she turned out, for what he did to her. She will forever be his greatest failure.

It would have been nice to have been friends with Toris; he always got along well with Feliks and the other Baltic states, but he never stopped shaking in Ivan's presence and that made conversing hard.

And once there had been Yao. They don't talk anymore; maybe they never will.

Ivan's friends are few and far between, to say the least.

Blowing out a puff of smoke and taking a sip of vodka, the Russian nation at least knows he has three nations to turn to: Gilbert, who's forgiven him because the Prussian understands the importance of family and so accepts Ivan in as part of his; Francis, the foul-weather friend who took him in when the tsar died, then took in his daughter when he once again had nowhere else to turn; and Erzsi. Beautiful, loving, Hungarian Erzsi.

Strictly speaking, she has to enter Russia on her Russian passport or else the government in Budapest is notified, her Hungarian papers making entry into her former home forbidden. Also strictly speaking, Ivan has been ordered to kill her at least twenty times.

The woman shifts, the side of her face rubbing against his upper body as she settles in a little higher up, hair tickling his collar bone. He knows when he finishes his vodka and cigarette it will be awkward trying to sleep; Erzsi was always a deep sleeper but sometimes even her Russian lover rolling over wakes her now, as if she's always waiting for the next message from Chernobyl, the next great catastrophe.

Chernobyl had been awful; never, never, had Ivan Braginski wanted to die so much as then. The horrors he had seen, had known were inevitable once he had returned to the Ukrainian town, they had been too much for even the Russian. In the day he had helped evacuate townspeople, or spread the news, or gone in closer where the engineers refused because his health had seemed so less important when the lives of others were in danger. At night Ivan had wandered around the countryside, his back to the nuclear plant, or laid under the moon and cried silently tears few would ever pity him for.

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fucking fair. Why was it always Ivan, or Ivan's family, or Ivan's friends? Why was it always the Russian? It was so fucking unfair, all he had ever done was try to be the best nation he could, to be loyal and truthful and diligent. And every time something went wrong Ivan felt it was his fault though Irina would tell him it was out of his control and Nata would hold him and tell him he was perfect and that she would love him forever.

Notes had been the one luxury he had had at Pripyat, quickly written in angry moments, addressed to Nata because he knew they would get through then. "Evacuation, but it's too late. -В". "Never should have come to this. -В". And when Ivan had finally returned, exhausted, collapsing, the other nations had for once been kind. Toris and Feliks had carried him up the stairs, and when Ivan had woken once more it was to find himself in a bath being washed by Erzsi, her faced stained with tears. They'd stumbled to the bed and when he'd fallen on to it the Russian had had just enough strength left to pull Erzsi to him, holding her as the real tears fell.

It wasn't fucking fair, he was suppose to be the strongest nation and yet he so often felt like the weakest, like he was constantly dying. Each time the government changes quickly it is as if they are sick, dying even, and Ivan hates that the most, hates feeling like a little boy who would never make it to his tenth birthday or a young soldier who would never return to the home he had left behind. Each tear shed had been letting go, letting go of the pretense that Ivan was strong, that Ivan was heartless, that Ivan was invincible. He remembers holding Erzsi as close as he could that first night back, because he had been so convinced that that was their last night, that he wouldn't survive the collapse this time and that the Hungarian would go back to her Austrian lover and forget him.

Because there had never been a question of if Erzsi would stay or leave; he had known from the beginning that she was not his to have, his to hold, forever.

Her tears had been the worst though, crying that it was too early for goodbyes, that the Hungarian wasn't ready, not yet, to leave, because she loved him. She hated him and she had every right to hate him and Ivan hopes she never stops hating him because he is a disgusting excuse for a man, but she loved him too and still loves him and it wasn't fair. Why couldn't she just be his forever?

"Vanya." Erzsi shifts, one hand coming to cup the side of his face, the other helping her sit up enough to press her lips to his. The cigarette is stubbed out, the tumbler placed down, and Ivan pulls his lover to him too tightly, arms wrapping around her back and pulling her completely to him.

They're perfect together. Their history is one of abuse and battles and torture and so many awful things, and yet they are perfect together. Erzsi is headstrong, rebellious, an untamable spirit that Ivan has never felt intimidated by. And Ivan is vicious, violent, cruel as they come but Erzsi has never backed down from him, always stood her ground, always seen something beautiful in the ugly man.

"Vanya, shh." Her lips kiss his hideous nose and lustful eyes and the tears on his blood-stained cheeks that Ivan isn't worthy of crying. "It's ok Vanya, it's going to be ok." Her hands touch his scarred chest, hold his hands that have committed so many crimes, her shoulder pressing into that frozen, dead heart. "I love you Vanya and you love me and nothing else matters Vanya, nothing else matters, so please don't cry Vanya. Please don't cry.

"I love you."

They're perfect together because she is his world and he is her world and what does the rest matter then?

It wasn't fair.

When they make love again Erzsi swears she will never leave him, something she had once told Ivan she would never say, and he believes her. Oh how he believes her.

She's watching him; he can feel her eyes on the side of his head as he finishes writing the last of the letters at the kitchen table, Erzsi on the couch with her packed bag. She never brings clothes with her when she comes, nor when she leave; only a bag full of tchotchkes for their grandchildren, letters from their grandfather, and one longer letter for their beautiful daughter.

If at the end of his life all Ivan can look back on and be proud of is Anastasiya Ivanovna Braginski, his little Anya that he loves so much because she is the one good thing Ivan has ever done, then that would be enough he thinks, closing the envelope and handing it to the parting Hungarian.

Erzsi's smile is bittersweet. "Vanya," and her voice drifts off dreamily. The Russian nods, not wanting to meet her eyes, but when she doesn't continue he relents, swallowing before turning to look. Her eyes are so green, like the leaves of a sunflower, or grass in a sunny field, like their daughter's eyes or a flawless emerald. And they are so loving, all of that love and all that beauty that comes from leading a good life, all focused on her imperfect Russian sinner. "I love you Vanya. Come with me, come back to Budapest with me Vanya."

He's already shaking his head as the woman sighs, standing to come before him.

"One day they will take you back, your government will find stability, but for now you are not needed here. You are needed with me, and with Anya, and with the kids. Let's run away," she whispers, Erzsi bending to look up into his eyes. "Let's run and never look back, till we find a never-ending field of sunflowers Vanya, let's be together forever."

Hands cup the sides of that soft Hungarian face before he pulls her up to his lips, kissing Erzsi like she's his only source of air. For years he dreamed of running away to that nonexistent field, of running with Erzsi and never looking back. But he knows now such dreams of a brighter future are stupid; Ivan has given up all hope.

"Szeretlek," Ivan whispers against his lover's lips, her eyes still closed as he takes her in. She nods once, smiling bittersweetly, before she kisses him, standing and zipping up her duffle bag.

"Walk me to the station?"

He's on his third cigarette since Erzsi got on the plane; he'd watched it fly out before walking the distance back home. He's in no rush, no where to go, no one else to see. His phone vibrates from a text and that's probably his eldest grandson telling him he's survived another day of soldiering, or the youngest one having stolen his mother's phone while he sits under her desk at the UN. Or maybe it's Francis, who found a new book for them to read, or any number of nations who have the number they will never use but maybe, just maybe, they'll consider calling before inevitably changing their mind.

On the bridge Ivan can see protestors in the distance, organizing, discussing, trying to make a difference. Ivan tried hard to make a difference, for so long. The only hope he has left is Erzsi and the life she gave him, the life she breathed back into him with her love and his daughter and their grandchildren that come from that shared love.

He takes a drag on the cigarette, the warmth filling his lungs, before he decides to go for street food. Fuck it, he was no longer the Russian Federation anyway; Ivan Braginski was a free agent, to do as he wanted, and right now that involved tea, some take-out, and another cigarette.