I.O.N Norilsk AU ❄️

You are Yasha, an autistic teenager bullied by his family for being queer. After a heated argument, he runs away from home and takes a train to a friend's in Siberia, but accidentally ends up alone in wintry Norilsk. Confused and cold, he is almost hit by the black BMW of Georgy Alexandrovich (GA), a deeply depressed mine manager who doesn't want to live.

GA helps the guy: takes him home, warms him up, and gives him coffee. He's nominally married, but he runs away from his wife on business trips, rents a three-room apartment, and is going through a difficult midlife crisis. GA wants to buy Yasha tickets home, but he tearfully begs her not to send him back to his family—"his parents will kill him." The man gives in and lets her stay in the empty room.

Thus begins their life together: GA is absent from work, Yasha waits for him, offers him tea with condensed milk, and helps around the house. The guy asks her to find him a job, and GA gets him a job at a candy stand. In the evenings, the apartment is no longer dark and empty: anime and games can be heard from Yasha's room, tea warms them, and for the first time in a long time, GA feels like someone is waiting for him. Yasha wears GA's stretched-out sweaters, rejoices at his arrival—and this silly, cheerful guy becomes the only ray of light in the icy Arctic winter.

Continued: GA learns Yasha's secret—the reason he was kicked out. The boy, terrified, expects a beating and more expulsion. But GA, though far removed from "Western trends," understands: he wants this idiot to stay. Yasha is his "warmth in the middle of January," his hot coffee and a smile that makes time stand still.

However, the neighbors notice the new tenant. Kind Grandma Anya is friendly to Yasha, but her niece Sima has long disliked GA. She guesses the nature of their relationship, spreads rumors about "two faggots," and tries to turn the entire building against them. GA is starting to be looked at askance.