hello! i am the writer of the match on ao3, if you're looking for a sram fic to read, here's the link. it's a kolacic wip dating app AU with html coding, and it's updated every sunday. i'd say it's pretty cool to check out :) we finally made it to my favorite episode of og skam's season 3 and its equivalent: chapter 9. if you stumbled across this and you haven't seen sram, you can watch it for free on youtube.
so, i kind of poured my own heart into this chapter, because the topic is something that hits very close to home, so i tried to get it right for my own peace of mind.
here are some details you might have missed in this chapter:
first of all, thank you for saying i did a good job portraying ivan's manic episode. i've done a good amount of research for chapter 8–i wanted to give something raw and memorable to read, without turning it into melodrama. mental illness is a topic that hits particularly close to home for me. i've been in lovro's position more than once, with different people, therefore i resonate with him a lot when it comes to this. he's the only isak who isn't scared of the bipolar aspect, but rather the idea that ivan's feelings weren't real, and that's what i made this chapter all about. the wikipedia page i coded has text from the real one. the reddit post from isak was made by going on actual subreddits where people with bipolar significant others would describe their experiences. by no means can a piece of fiction educate someone, but if i managed to help even one person understand bipolar disorder a little better through my writing, then i did everything i wanted to do. being bipolar isn't the most important thing about ivan, but it IS a part of him that i could never erase. i wanted to handle it with the utmost care i was capable of, given the fact that this story doesn't have him as a main point of view. being on either end of a relationship like this will never be easy, but it's also not impossible. i wanted to keep it realistic in that sense.
nedjelja 09:31 became a fully fleshed scene, because that's what it deserved. i wrote it as a reference to skam españa's reunion scene from ep 9, in which cris asks her brother to take her to the hospital after joana's attempt. i also just generally have a soft spot for ana dević and her relationship with lovro, so i will write her in anywhere i can.
thank god allofskam got taken down after i wrote chapter 8, who knows what crazy idea i would've come up with due to that (for those who are wondering, ivan would have been saying the directors are trying to get rid of them by deleting the show). i am still recovering from this.
sonja says He kept talking about the 'directors' and how he needed to get back home before the hedgehog woke up. i am sure people caught this reference, but still, the hedgehog is a nod to lucas from skam france. He always dreamt of playing in the Euroleague is a reference to another one of ivan's social media posts.
the quran is an obvious nod to og skam and how sonja tells isak 'even memorized it because he thought it was a good idea'. now, in my version, sonja goes further and tells lovro about mihael (croatian mikael). i decided to make him bosnian to make it more likely for him to be muslim, since i know the muslim minority in croatia is pretty small. i've also just been thinking a lot about croatian mikael lately, and reading fanfics on ao3 about it, so that's just kind of showing here.
it's not a reference, but i just want to point out how lovro's relationship with his mother progressed throughout this story. this whole scene of lovro crying in his mother's arms was written as a parallel to chapter 5: Despite it all, the one he had let down the most was his own mother. When Lovro thought of her, something inside him finally gave way. He couldn't keep it in anymore. Tears streaked down his face, hot and heavy. He was crying, truly crying, and he couldn’t remember the last time he had allowed himself to. lovro's relationship with his mother is a very complex one to me, and although he has a hard time understading her sometimes, lovro looks at her with admiration. again, chapter 5: His mother's voice slipped in with the things she'd always told him. Be kind. Treat girls right. Don’t be like those boys. Don't be like your father. A bitter laugh almost escaped him. What would she say if she saw him now, standing here, shaking under the water, after kissing someone else behind his girlfriend’s back? when lovro got into that fight at the club in chapter 4, we see him recoiling at his mother's touch afterwards. now, in chapter 9, lovro is fully sinking into her arms for comfort. i think this progression is very important and worth mentioning here.
People usually bring flowers for hospital visits vs People usually bring their loved ones flowers for hospital visits. see what i did there? :)
Maybe Ivan didn't even like boys, and it was just a sick idea he had right now. – reference to what sonja tells isak at the end of ep 8 in skam
since i refuse to code lovro talking to chatgpt because i have dignity, i made him go on wikipedia like isak does in the original. i hope everyone got the cookies double entendre, you know, kolacic, cookies...!!
lovro coming out to his father was probably the biggest step of his self acceptance journey–and he'd done it mostly out of anger this time. the message he sends is a reference to isak's message to his mother from episode 7: 'sorry if it made you sad. hugs from isak'. meanwhile, lovro says 'i don't really care if this makes you sad. you never cared when i was sad either.'
the idea of lovro reaching out to isak valtersen for advice regarding bipolar disorder had me on a chokehold. i added some of the people who are regularly leaving me comments in the reddit thread. <3
THE WATCH! THE WATCH!! everything circles back to that watch. in sram, lovro forgets his hoodie at ivan's place, so i changed it to ivan leaving his watch at lovro's. it's very symbolical, actually. on one hand, the watch is one of the first things lovro notices about ivan in chapter 2 when they hang out after the karaoke party. on the other hand, the idea of lovro finding ivan's watch of all things represents, in my vision, the idea that they haven't run out of time. of course, the watch can also be seen as a reference to 'minute by minute'. when lovro puts it on, it doesn't fit perfectly, just like how him and ivan aren't fit for each other from a surface level. but that doesn't stop lovro from wearing it–or choosing ivan–for that matter. i also made a little title drop here by saying it's not a match. the watch in the match is its own character, and this is a rhyme, which makes it even better.
when lovro returns the watch and puts it on ivan's wrist, this is the dialogue between them:
“I thought I lost it forever,” he muttered. “It was here all this time," Lovro said, then gave Ivan’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “See? We have time.”
double meaning strikes again here. they could totally just be talking about the watch, but they could also be talking about themselves. 'i thought i lost it forever', 'it was here all this time' – the word it could be replaced with the watch, it could be replaced with lovro, their relationship or even with ivan losing himself. ivan losing his watch could very much be a symbol of him losing the person he used to be. everyone can choose whichever interpretation they like best, this is why i kept it a little vague. also, 'we still have time' is a reference to the first clip of sram's ep 10.
lovro pays for his bus ticket this time, unlike in chapter 5, because he has no time to waste and because ivan is no longer with him to argue with ticket inspectors. i know most people caught the druck reference.
the blue pencils! His eyes were colored in with a soft blue pencil that stood out against the graphite. in chapter 5, lovro tells ivan that isak has green eyes, and ivan responds by saying 'but i don't have green pencils'. well, turns out, he has blue ones. yes, i've had this planned since chapter 5.
the letter and the zavičaj 'montage' are my favorite pieces of coding from this entire fic. this is my favorite clip from the third season, so i had to include it somehow. i have no idea if people were expecting subota 11:30, but i hope it was a cool surprise. this is like a love letter to all of the evak remakes across the skamverse. i included a reference to the little prince here: To them, you’re nothing more than two sick boys like hundreds of others, but to the universe, you’re fate. it's a reference to the famous fox scene from the book: To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys, but if you tame me, then we shall need each other.
right before this sequence starts, there is that one line: And now, it was Lovro’s turn to save Ivan right back. i am convinced everyone got this reference, but still–it's a nod to romeo and julliet & what even tells isak in ep 8 at the hotel.
zavičaj means homeland. i ended this little part with No matter the country, they remain each other's Homeland. the capital H was on purpose.
so will we discuss the elephant in the room that is lovro's relationship with his father? of course we will. this has been one of his internal conflicts throughout the whole story, starting from around chapter 4 until now. what i will say is that i hated when people were speculating ivan might be violent during his manic episode. this completely contradicts even's entire character, as it was proven in season 4 of skam. the reason why i am pointing this out is because violence is a topic with lots of potential to be explored through the isak characters instead, and especially lovro. in chapter 5, lovro gets into two physical fights that cause him to completely shut down emotionally:
in the show, i found it very interesting how they portrayed that scene of nora and roko breaking up. we see roko being violent towards nora, and we see lovro flinching differently than eva does, for instance. when vito and his boyfriend were arguing, he waited by the door like a child would when parents would fight. after the nora scene, lovro tells her 'don't put up with it, trust me, it never ends well', which in my interpretation, means that lovro is already familiar with these kind of situations happening at home.
i pointed this out because it ties with my next idea. the reveal that lovro's father had been violent, although not constantly, was something i decided on based on the subtle portrayal of lovro's relationship with violence from the show. in the match, lovro constantly thinks about how much resentment he feels towards his father, while also clinging to him because he desperately wants a father figure. the idea that lovro is and forever will be his father's son is something i added in multiple chapters, because it is true. he will never be able to overwrite his dna, and that is why he despises violence, although it's part of him by nature. lovro is aware of it and rejects it, ultimately choosing that he doesn't want to be anything like this man, and goes down to follow his own path by running after ivan. i hope i managed to develop this storyline in an intriguing way, even though it's been more of a subtle subplot. it's important to lovro's characterization. end of rant.
as i previously said, i see vito as a father figure to lovro. although it was a pure coincidence that vito called lovro right after he got that text from his father, it was a definitive writing choice on my part.
i made them stay on the bed because censorship isn't real in the match, only in ivan's mind in chapter 8. i rest my case. see you in chapter 10.
before lovro tells ivan he loves him, this is the passage: “He couldn't believe he was about to say it. He really was going to do it. Lovro was –”. this is a direct parallel i made with chapter 6 when lovro comes out to jakov:
Lovro swallowed once. Then again. Then a third time. He was gonna do it. He lifted his gaze, meeting Jakov’s eyes.
in the end, ivan wasn't mad at lovro for the lie, mostly because he'd always suspected it. it wouldn't be fair for him to be upset with lovro for hiding this, when he'd also hidden his bipolar disorder, so they're kind of on the same page about that. in chapter 8, it was mostly the shock combined with the episode ivan was going through rather than real anger. i do not perceive ivan as an 'angry' person in general, but that's just my interpretation of him. besides, ivan would have forgiven lovro regardless, because he just really is down bad in every universe.
the tea is something i mentioned in my note for chapter 7, and it's a parallel that i've been planning since chapter 4. here's my post from chapter 7, in case you don't remember anymore:
when they get to ivan's place [chapter 7], ivan makes them tea. this is a parallel to chapter 4 when lovro shows up to vito's doorstep during the rainstorm and he also makes them tea. what i wanted to do show here was how these are both two important people for lovro, offering him comfort. why tea? well, that's a reference to skam season 4 when sana goes to visit evak and isak offers her some awful tea and he says even is the one who knows how to make it.
so now lovro is the one who hands ivan the tea, offering him comfort.
the hand holding is something i really have been highlighting since lovro sees ivan and sonja at that party, holding hands. lovro craves the romantic aspect the most, because it's the one thing he never got, and what is more romantic and pure than holding hands? we see ivan drawing lovro's hands in chapter 6, and we see him drawing multiple hands on the sketches from his bed in chapter 8. lovro puts on the watch because it's the closest thing he has to holding ivan's hand. in the o helga natt text message, ivan says they're holding hands for eternity. when lovro returns the watch, he gives ivan's hand a gentle squeeze. when they finally go to sleep, they are holding hands. lovro really wanted to just hold hands all this time, and he finally got it. there's many layers to this: hand holding as a display of public affection (and we know what that's like in their situation), the innocence of first love and holding hands as in literally holding onto the other person.
i feel like this is a lot, so please do not think that i am crazy... i swear that i am the most average person you could think of. i will stop here (because this post turned out to be huge). i hope these posts are interesting as well, because for me, the match has been less fanfiction and more of a writing exercise. i wanted to see how far i could go when it comes to references, parallels and foreshadowing. i love the skamverse like it's own baby, so this was perfect–but more on that when i'll make my last post. if you want to share your thoughts with me, i'd be more than grateful!
thank you so much for reading! you're so cool. see you in 2 weeks. <3
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