They both pass the exam. Not with flying colors, but with a passing grade. They move into a tiny odnushka (one-room apartment) near the metro. The romance isn't a fairy tale; it is the quiet victory of finding a partner who will help you carry the groceries up five flights of stairs in January without complaining.

Unlike the American "jock-nerd" binary, Russian student romantic archetypes are rooted in socioeconomic reality and literary tradition.