Making Sasha glow makes Lev feel happy and protective and proud. 

"They shouldn't have done that shit to you, I-- it's okay not to want kids." He pauses. "But when Claire has a baby I am going to steal it and read it the entire Science for Babies series."

"You're really good at explaining things, I bet you'd be great with kids. Part of it was that they were really invested in having a daughter who'd give them grandkids, I keep checking my email and half-expecting to find something from my mom still calling me Allie and asking when I'm going to have children and don't I want them to get to know their grandparents." 

"Calling you what?"

"Allie, short for Alexa, which is why I now shorten to Sasha instead of Alex. Doesn't fit at all, does it." 

"I... recognize in theory that you must have had a name before you transitioned but THIS IS DISTURBING."

Lev is cute.

"My best friend in elementary and middle school called me Allie-gator." 

"Allie-gator is an acceptable Sasha name."

"I thought so too. She knew me better than they did. Have I told you in the last twenty minutes that you're adorable?" 

"Nope! You should do it again."

"You're adorable and I love you." 

"If we have kids-- which, to be clear, is not a thing I actually expect to happen at this point-- then I say your parents don't get to meet their grandkids."

"Oh, of course not, when you disown your kid you should expect to lose the privilege of meeting your grandkids." 

"My thoughts exactly."

Lev is good and should be cuddled. 

Sasha is also good and should be cuddled!

(Slightly sadly.)

The sadness doesn't go unnoticed. Sasha's a little bit clingier than usual. 

Oh no. 

Lev wants to respond to this by running away but that worked really poorly last time! So he says, "you're doing the thing where you hold me as tight as you can which you only do when you're sad or when I didn't let you finish last time we had sex, what's up?"

"Sometimes when I'm anxious my brain decides to play Things Malcolm Said But In Lev's Voice, Ten Hour Version, which is stupid for a variety of reasons including that you've never used the word heteropatriarchal in your life, but there you go." 

"I believe that is the first time in my life I've ever heard the word 'heteropatriarchal' although I think I can probably reconstruct what it means. --If you want to tell me about it I can confirm that I would not say those things and if you don't I can just hug you."

"It's a lot of ranting that essentially boils down to me being a selfish bitch. I know you wouldn't. Hugs are nice." 

"I would never call you a selfish bitch! I love you and you are the best thing that has ever happened to me and also I like being able to make you happy."

He holds Lev just a little tighter. 

"I love you." 

"I love you too!"

(He still has some vague freefloating sad.) 

Lev loves him and isn't going to decide having kids is more important than being married to him and Sasha can relax. 

He kisses Lev's forehead and clings less. 

He relaxes when Sasha clings less, and is held, and is only a little sad that he won't get to find out what kind of awesome person Lev genes and Sasha genes would make.