Ivan was awoken by a text from Tino the next morning. You're still coming, right? You have to!

Ivan sighed as he rolled out of bed. Tino was strange to Ivan; he was insistent and always expected people to comply with him. Ivan wondered how Berwald dealt with that.

Yeah, sure. When are you getting there? Ivan shot back his reply .

As usual, Tino texted back immediately. About an hour from now. Matthias and Lukas are joining us at one.

You should come at one, too. Alfred and Arthur are coming around then, and I know Arthur wants to hear about how you and Yao met.

Ivan didn't respond again. He looked at the time: about eleven 'o' clock.

Could he walk to the library and still make it to the gym on time?

Yeah, probably. He dressed quickly, and pulled his coat and scarf on, going out the door. It was windy and rainy and Ivan was near soaked by the time he made it to the corner.

Today, he honestly wasn't going just to see Yao. He wanted to pikc up a Russian-English dictionary and work on his specific vocabulary.

When he arrived at the library, soaking wet, he made his way to the foreign languages, shivering as he went.

As soon as he got the Russian/Ukrainian section, of course, Yao came around the corner, scanning the shelves with his eyes dutifully. He didn't even see Ivan until they were seven feet away from each other and Ivan was just starting at him blankly.

"Hello Ivan! I did not see you there! Wow, you're soaked," Yao exclaimed, frowning at Ivan's dripping coat. "You should take that coat off before you catch a cold/"

Yao helped him take the coat off, seeing as the soaked sleeves were clinging insistently to his damp skin.

"You're gonna need something hot to drink, yes? Are you staying very long? I'll got get you a cocoa from the Starbucks across the street."

"No, that's okay, I'm Russian, I—"

"No, nope, none of that. I'm going. Go up to the table and I'll be right back. Cocoa or cider?"

Ivan stayed stubbornly silent—he did not want Yao to get him a 'cocoa' as if he were a child! How embarrassing!

That is, until, Yao glared at him, and repeated. "Cocoa, or cider, Ivan. Well?" His voice was dangerous and Ivan suddenly didn't feel like being stubborn any more.

"… Cocoa."

Yao's stern face broke into a smile. "Great. I'll be right back."

He went off through the aisles toward the street.

Ivan begrudgingly grabbed a book and went upstairs.

Ivan was late to the gym.

When he got there, Arthur, Alfred, Sadiq, and the five Nordics were waiting near the full-body machines and the benches around them.

"So, it appears that someone didn't tell us about their birthday," Tino said, looking pointedly at Ivan.

"Tut, tut," Matthias said, shaking his head.

"What did you do?" Ivan asked, seeing through their 'disappointment'. They were up to something, it seemed.

"We got you a present! We all chipped in and got you a gym bag with some stuff."

Stuff? Ivan wondered.

Tino held the bag out in front of him. It was a nice Nike one, and Ivan could feel that there was a water bottle, some gym clothes, and maybe some shoes in it.

"Really? You didn't need to do that. How did you even find out it was my birthday?"

"Whoa, slow down there friend. You don't have to act so excited about it," Lukas said dryly.

"Romano told us," Arthur explained over the Norwegian's snide comment.

"All the clothes are Berwald's size; I assumed they'd fit you too, but they all have gift receipts in case they don't. Anyway…"

"Tell us more about Yao!"

"How did you two even meet? He doesn't ever go anywhere social, except the damn library or bookstore or whatnot. Unless you met him at the library," Arthur said, sitting on a bench.

One look at Ivan and Arthur knew the answer to his question.

"You seriously met at the fucking library? Really?"

"That's so romantic!" Tino chimed in excitedly.

"But—I already said—we're not dating!" Ivan reiterated exasperatedly.

"You should be, though!"

"When are you gonna ask him out?" Matthias asked.

"Ask… him out?"

"Yeah, like on a date."

"Oh. Well, I…"

"You were planning to ask him, right?"

"No, not really."

"Well, when you do," Arthur started, "beware of his little brother. They live together and he is super protective of Yao. Even if you aren't dating, if he notices you spending lot of time with Yao he'll demand to meet you. And he'll probably tear you apart verbally."

"His little brother? Kiku?"

"Wait, you've met him?"

"No, not yet. Yao's just talked about him before?"

"Man, I'll tell you," Alfred said, taking a bite of a hamburger (where did he get that from?), "Kiku and I were best friends freshmen year in high school." Alfred nodded nostalgically. "Then came sophomore year. And he became 'best friends' with Ludwig the Nazi over there," Alfred pointed over at the blond man, lifting weights in the corner as he had been last time Ivan was here.

"Alfred! Just because he's German does not mean he's a Nazi! Stop being racist!" Arthur smacked him over the head.

"Hey! I'm not being racist, I'm just pointing out that he probably hates Jews!"

"I can hear you, jackass," Ludwig called from across the mostly-empty gym.

Arthur just glared at Alfred, shaking his head.

"I cannot believe you right now." Arthur turned back to Ivan. "Well, I am still upset that Yao hasn't told me anything about you. I saw him just last Sunday and he didn't say a word! Speaking of which," he looked at his watch, "I have to run. I've got a late lunch with him in a half hour. Are you ready to go Alfred? Nice chatting with you fellows."

That night, Ivan unzipped the gym bag the guys had bought him to find exactly what he had expected.

He pulled the items out and laid them out on the couch beside him. There was a pair of tennis shoes (which were miraculously his size), a light blue tank top, some gym shorts, sweat pants, a red short sleeved shirt, a water bottle, and a towel. He checked the sizes and eyed the clothes carefully, before deciding all of it would fit. Tino is very good at picking out gifts.

He unzipped the side pockets, also. They were mostly all empty: some had tags or other small items.

When he got to the very last one, however, he was surprised to find one final gift.

It was a DVD with a sticky note stuck on its' cover. "From Matthias, with love 3".

He pulled the sticky note off and nearly dropped the case. Pocahontass was the title, and on the cover there was an almost-nude woman with what appeared to be a stereotypical Native American deerskin dress. Ivan didn't know what to do with this. He'd heard of porn before but he'd never before been confronted with it face to face.

Ivan was still gawking at this gift when his phone buzzed in his pocket. It was a text from Arthur. I take back what I said about Yao never talking about you. He wouldn't stop talking about you once he found out we knew each other. He forced me to give him your phone number. I hope that's alright.

What.

What. Shit.

Ivan stared at the little screen, frozen once again, until another message popped up on screen.

It was from an unknown number.

Hi Ivan! This is Yao! I didn't know you knew Arthur! Small world, huh? :)

Oh shit.