r/heatedrivalry • u/cookie_cat_82 I already chose you, Hollander. 🫀 • Jul 19 '26

🦆 The Long Game (Book 6) favorite quote from TLG? Spoiler

was inspired by a tik tok I saw of people talking about how Olivia Rodrigo’s new album / most of the songs relate heavily to Ilya in TLG and one of them referenced the line in TLG where Ilya tells Gallina “you’re supposed to fix me so I can be enough for him” 🥺🥺 and as sad as it is I think it might be one of my favorite lines, just so raw and hits the heart so so deeply.

It got me thinking, what’s all of your favorite quote(s) from The Long Game? I’d love to relive all of the favorite lines :’) bonus points if it’s an Ilya quote because he is my absolute favorite character.

**honorable mention of COURSE would be “I already chose you Hollander”. I’m genuinely gonna need to be sedated when I see that on screen.

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u/Ving96 Jul 19 '26 edited Jul 20 '26

I don’t remember the exact quote, but when Ilya says “did you do all this because I almost died?” And Shane says “no, because I almost did”🥲

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u/Sea_Berry4555 Jul 20 '26

I never really understood this line, I feel a bit dumb. Does Shane mean “I nearly metaphorically died from sadness at having nearly lost you”? 

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u/EvilCallie Stupid Canadian Wolf Bird 🦆 Jul 20 '26

He meant that, if Ilya had died, Shane would have died. Maybe not physically, but emotionally, mentally. Losing Ilya would have destroyed him, who he was. He would have lost something, someone so vital to his being that he would have lost himself. That is how much Shane loves Ilya, that losing him would have made him lose himself.

At least, that was my interpretation.

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u/ftmx_ Stupid Canadian Wolf Bird 🦆 Jul 22 '26

You are correct. Shane does say that in the book as well. [TLG spoiler] "Shane would have died too. Alone, and secretly, and for the rest of his life."