Chapter Text
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'Remember the day
Cause this is what dreams should always be
I just want to stay
I just want to keep this dream in me'
Ryan Star, Losing Your Memory
---
Pain. Yuuri knew pain. Was familiar with it thanks to the many blisters on his feet, and the countless dark bruises on his knees and hips that he'd gathered over the years. Had gotten used to it whenever he'd scraped his hands on the cold, unforgiving ice of the rink. He was also no stranger to that bone deep exhaustion that hurt so good, because it meant that he'd pushed himself to the limit, made sure he'd done everything he could to perform to the best of his ability.
And then there was a different kind of pain. A pain that had nothing to do with his body, but with the demons hiding inside of his own head, the ones that taunted him whenever he'd failed. Yet again, they would kindly point out, even though Yuuri never asked them to. It wasn't a physical sort of pain, but at times, he was sure that it hurt more than whatever injuries his skating career had thrown at him so far.
All of the above made it so that Yuuri wasn't all that impressed by the dull ache at the back of his head when he slowly woke up from what felt like possibly a two year long nap. He groaned when he tried to open his eyes, coming to the conclusion that his eyelids were exceptionally heavy today. Today. What even was today? Yuuri wasn't sure.
His ears registered a shrill beeping noise somewhere to his left. Beep, beep, beep. Yuuri flinched, and this time he did manage to open his eyes. He blinked, gasping for breath as he took in his surroundings. The sound came from a monitor nearby, and the bed that he was in was unmistakably a hospital bed. There was a window to his right, but hideous flowery curtains were blocking his view. He became aware of the bandages that were slightly too tight around his head.
Still feeling a little drowsy, panic didn't take over right away, and Yuuri tried to remember something. Anything, really. After a long minute, he sighed in relief when he realized that he was in fact able to put two and two together. His mom, his mom had called. Telling him that his dog Vicchan had passed away, the very night before Yuuri was supposed to perform his free skate at the Grand Prix Final.
And surely he'd done what he always did; he'd turned to food to comfort him, and then... Then, as the cherry on top, he'd messed everything up by letting his anxiety take over. Everything that he'd worked so hard for, gone. Even more so, it seemed that he'd screwed up one of his jumps so spectacularly that it had earned him a one way ticket to the hospital. Go figure, wasn't that just the story of his life?
He was this close to laughing at himself in cruel disbelief, when the green door to his left opened, distracting him. A young woman with dark curly hair walked in, offering him a smile.
"Ah, you're awake," she greeted him in accented English. "Took you a while, but I'm glad you're with us again. I'm going to run a few tests, if you'll allow."
She handed Yuuri a pair of glasses, and everything became sharper the second he put them on. He stared at her, blood rushing to his cheeks when he figured that she was waiting for him to talk to her like an actual human being.
"Oh... I..." his throat was sore and he cleared it, then tried again. "I mean, yes, go ahead... Are you a nurse?"
A stupid question of course, but when he glanced at his arm and spotted the IV, he suspected that there were definitely some drugs in his system to keep the pain at bay.
She grinned at him before correcting him. "Doctor, actually," she paused once she was standing right beside Yuuri's bed.
"Can you move everything? Arms? Legs?" she checked as she leaned closer and went to work, pulling out a small light that she instructed Yuuri to follow with his eyes.
Yuuri considered her question while he did as told, then lifted his arms, sat a little straighter, and experimentally wiggled his toes under the ugly yellow sheets.
"That would be a yes," she noted. "Do you know where you are?" she added after a brief look at the clipboard on the tiny table beside the bed.
"The hospital," Yuuri deadpanned. He blamed the drugs.
It was a good thing that his doctor seemed to have a sense of humor, because she chuckled before asking her next question. "Alright, let me rephrase, do you know who you are?"
At least that was an easy question, and Yuuri dutifully supplied a summary. "Katsuki Yuuri, born and raised in Hasetsu, Japan, professional figure skater who made it to the Grand Prix Final and I... my dog died the other day, and I- I screwed up."
He'd mumbled the last part, casting his eyes down in shame. When he peeked up again, his doctor smiled at him sympathetically.
"I'm sorry to hear that," she replied, sounding genuine. "As for the good news though, all of your scans are looking perfectly fine. I'm not going to sugarcoat it, your head will probably hurt for the next two weeks or so, but there was no permanent brain damage as far as we can see, which is a miracle considering that fall you made on the ice. We had to wait until you woke up to make sure that nothing was off, but there are no obvious problems with your speech or memory, so I'd say the odds are in your favor. All you need is a lot of rest, and preferably an environment with minimal stress."
She winked good-naturedly as she quickly scribbled something down on her clipboard, telling Yuuri that she'd be back later to check if anything had changed, just to make sure.
Before she disappeared through the door, she threw him one last look over her shoulder, cheerfully telling him "I'll let your coach know that you're awake and that he can see you now, he's been in the waiting area for six hours, he was worried sick."
Yuuri frowned, but nodded. He hoped Celestino wasn't too upset with him.
Then again, his coach was kind enough, and Yuuri had warned him before the free skate that he wasn't feeling his best after his mother had called him to break the news. Of course, Celestino had only done what he'd thought was right when he'd pushed Yuuri to skate anyway, because it would've been a huge waste if Yuuri didn't at least try after training so hard for months. He'd meant well, afraid that Yuuri would regret it if he hadn't given it a shot. Knowing himself, he might have regretted it, so he couldn't blame his coach, not really.
Feeling a bit lightheaded, Yuuri shifted on the bed, resting back against the pillows. He blamed both the painkillers and what surely was a serious concussion for his dizziness. Everything seemed fuzzy and weird, a tad surreal even.
When the door creaked open not much later, Yuuri already had an apology at the ready, in case Celestino wasn't entirely forgiving. However as he opened his mouth, he froze, his apology getting stuck in his throat as he immediately recognized the person waltzing through the door.
Because that was not Celestino Cialdini, not even close. That was Victor Nikiforov. The Victor Nikiforov. Russian skating legend and the world's hottest bachelor, Victor Nikiforov. Yuuri's idol, the guy he'd looked up to his entire life, the guy that he'd been wanting to meet as his equal at this exact Grand Prix Final. That Victor Nikiforov.
Before Yuuri could make sense of anything, aforementioned Victor Nikiforov was already invading Yuuri's personal space, firmly taking one of Yuuri's hands into both of his and kissing his knuckles. Over and over again, as if he was worshipping them.
"Yuuri! Thank god, you're alright! I've never been more scared in my life, I thought I'd lose you forever, I..."
And then Victor Nikiforov hiccupped and started sobbing. Uncontrollably. And Yuuri didn't get it, couldn't understand this entire scene, not one bit.
Unsurprisingly, Victor Nikiforov was beautiful even when crying. He was staring down at their intertwined hands in a futile attempt to hide his tears, and Yuuri took that opportunity to take a closer look at him.
Up close, his silvery hair looked softer and shinier than it had ever seemed on TV or in any of the posters that were covering the walls of Yuuri's childhood room. His eyes were bluer, his lashes longer; somehow cameras didn't do him justice, from the looks of it. Yuuri noticed traces of unnecessary make-up on his already flawless face, but his heart truly skipped a beat when Victor's outfit caught his eye. A sparkly skating costume, a costume that Yuuri vaguely recognized, but not quite. The purple and silver were foreign to him, but otherwise, it reminded him a lot of the ensemble in pink and gold that Victor had been wearing for his free skate. Yuuri hadn't seen much of Victor's program; he'd been too caught up in his own anxiety to even properly watch his idol's performance, but he'd seen enough of Victor backstage and in grainy ten second YouTube videos to recognize the design.
Yuuri's blood turned to ice. Why was he even worrying about details like that when all of this was so fundamentally wrong? Alarm bells went off in Yuuri's head as he caught up with what was happening.
'There was no permanent brain damage as far as we can see, which is a miracle considering that fall you made on the ice...'
That's what the doctor had said, but she'd been wrong, hadn't she? Totally wrong, because this wasn't real, couldn't be real. Yuuri was hallucinating, apparently his brain was making up dream scenarios that felt so real that it was absolutely terrifying. That was the only proper explanation here.
Or what if it was worse? He suddenly vaguely remembered that documentary that he'd once watched with Phichit, about people dreaming up entire lives while unconscious, only to be disappointed or heartbroken once they woke up from a coma. And it made sense, seeing as surely some painkillers wouldn't be able to conjure up a hallucination that vivid.
Actually thinking about it, all of it was ridiculous. If Yuuri's brain was trying to make this believable, it was doing a pretty poor job. He'd never met Victor Nikiforov in person, but he had a difficult time imagining that the guy would be as dramatic as to kneel by his bed still dressed up in a fancy costume, looking like a dream while crying like an award winning actor. And, repeat, they'd never even met.
And that was Yuuri's cue to panic, because this left him with two options; either he was still passed out, trapped in his own body in some hospital god knows where. Or his brain was more damaged than the doctors had anticipated, and he was losing his mind and going utterly insane after the fall.
Instinctively, he jerked his hand away, out of Victor's grasp. No, scratch that, that wasn't Victor Nikiforov. It was merely a cruel fantasy that Yuuri's brain had decided to torture him with.
Not-Victor's head shot up at the action, his mouth hanging open in shock, tears still steadily streaming down his cheeks.
"Get away from me, please..." Yuuri warned weakly, his voice breaking. "You're not real, get out! It's all in my head!"
"Yuuri..." again, not-Victor said his name as if it was the most precious word in the universe, and Yuuri shivered, unable to help himself. "Yuuri, what's wrong? Talk to me, you're scaring me."
Ha! Hallucination-Victor was the scared one? There had to be a joke in there, somewhere. But then Victor was reaching for Yuuri's hand again, and it triggered a full-blown panic attack when Yuuri's eyes accidentally fell on the matching golden rings on their fingers.
Yuuri hated himself. This was what he came up with, of all things? Being Victor Nikiforov's trophy husband? He was way too old to make up fairytales in which his idol was madly in love with him. It had been fun to imagine, back when he was sixteen, but he was a reasonably well functioning adult now, and he'd been over that for a long time. This was sick, so sick and disturbing. He shared that thought out loud.
"This is sick, I'm crazy, I'm a creep," he whimpered, his breathing going shallow, his vision getting blurry, hands going numb.
The expression on not-Victor's face was so crestfallen that Yuuri almost felt sorry for him. Almost, because none of it was actually happening, so it would be a waste of energy to pity a figment of his own imagination.
"Stop looking at me like that! Leave me alone!" Yuuri knew that he was all but yelling to none other than his own delusions, but his hands were trembling so badly, his chest still hurting.
His head was throbbing too, the pain suddenly unbearable. He wasn't breathing.
The last thing he saw before everything slipped away, were not-Victor's watery eyes, all of the color drained from his stupidly handsome face.
~~~
Yuuri slept. Slumbered. Tossed and turned at times, while other times he felt at peace. Or at least, he thought so, it was hard to tell, his concept of asleep or awake gone for the time being. He never opened his eyes though. Every now and then he heard voices, but he wasn't sure if any of those voices meant anything to him. Some were in English, others in Japanese, and he thought he vaguely recalled some Spanish being in there.
Ironically, the only voice that stood out at some point, was the one with a thick Russian accent. A temporary return of not-Victor.
'I'm sorry, my Yuuri... I can't be with you for now, they said I'll only make everything worse. I need you to get better, but I will be waiting for you. Always. In case you remember. '
The declaration was followed by a fleeting touch to Yuuri's right hand, but he'd been too tired to even worry about it, or to contemplate whether it was a dream or another hallucination. With it already being less realistic and more dreamlike, he took it as a sign that he was getting better. Or at the very least getting better at not confusing what was real with what wasn't.
He'd be alright, eventually. Everything would go back to normal, and he'd get another chance to skate, perhaps even make it to another Grand Prix Final. He was sure of it.
~~~
When Yuuri woke up, truly woke up, it was to a ray of sunlight peeking through the curtains, and two familiar voices. He could faintly make out the shape of his glasses on the nightstand, and he blindly reached for them, putting them on his nose. Sitting in two uncomfortable looking chairs in the corner of the room were his sister Mari and his mentor Minako, quietly talking to each other. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and sighed, relieved when he held up his hands in front of him and saw that there were no rings that didn't belong there.
He was going to be alright. It had probably been a combination of shock, and painkillers, and exhaustion. Nothing more. Yuuri could breathe again, quirking a smile when he tried to get the attention of the two women chatting.
"H-hey guys?"
"Yuuri!" Minako exclaimed, getting up from her seat and rushing up to him, carefully hugging him. "You're back!"
Mari appeared on the other side of his bed a second later, rolling her eyes and patting his cheek. "Don't ever scare us like that again, mom nearly had a heart attack," it almost came out as a threat, but Yuuri didn't miss the bare relief in her eyes, nor the black circles underneath them.
The three of them talked for a bit, small talk about how Yuuri felt now, and about how the typical smell of a hospital was awful and gross.
That was until Mari announced that she was going to get some coffee for herself and Minako, giving Minako a meaningful look before she left the room, mumbling something that sounded a lot like "you handle this one, you're probably better at it than I am anyway".
Yuuri didn't ask about the suspicious exchange, having a feeling that he was about to find out soon enough, knowing Minako.
Sitting on the edge of his bed, Minako's lips formed a tight line. That didn't bode well, did it?
"Yuuri..." she started, only to hesitate for a moment. "We had a chat with your doctor this morning, and she told us... Okay, I'm just going to say it as it is, after all that's what I do best, huh?"
"So say it," Yuuri urged, worried now. "Did they miss something? Am I going to die?"
"Nooo! Nothing like that," Minako quickly assured him. "You'll be fine, it's just that... Look, you're missing memories. A lot of them."
Yuuri gaped at her. Because that couldn't be true. He'd been out of it for a bit, sure, but he was alright now.
"But I'm... I'm not missing anything?" he argued, the words coming out as a question. "I'm Katsuki Yuuri, my hometown is Hasetsu, Japan. My mother's name is Hiroko and she makes the best pork cutlet bowls in the world, my father's name is Toshiya, my dog's name was Vicchan, but he died the other day which is why I messed up at the Grand Prix Final and hit my head on the ice, because I'm a professional figure skater, by the way."
Minako blinked at him.
"My best friend at home is Yuuko, we often skated together at the Ice Castle?" he tried.
Minako blinked some more.
"I live with my roommate and close friend Phichit in Detroit? Our coach's name is Celestino? I can't be missing that much," Yuuri insisted, hating that he felt in the dark again. "And where is Celestino, anyway?"
Minako's face fell, and she looked dejected.
"What?" he pressed, touching her arm. "Did I not get all of that right?"
A long silence.
"Ooh, Yuuri," she muttered, sounding eerily sad, tiredly running a hand through her hair. "You did get it right, sort of... But Vicchan dying, placing last at the Grand Prix Final... That all happened over a year ago! That's what you're missing, over a year of memories! You were at the final in Barcelona when you hit your head, not Sochi!"
Stunned at Minako's suggestion, Yuuri was weirdly reminded of some meme that Phichit used to mercilessly bother him with. It went something like 'that sounds fake, but okay'. He stared at Minako, tongue-tied. If she was speaking the truth, he had a million questions, and he couldn't possibly ask them all at once so he remained silent instead, contemplating.
Because why would she lie? They'd known each other for so long, and if Yuuri trusted anyone in life to guide him with nothing but blunt honesty, it was Minako-sensei. In the end though, if this was for real, he figured that one question was the most important one of them all.
"Will it come back?"
Minako smiled wryly. "We've been told that with time, there's a good chance. I'm going to let your doctor know that you're awake after your twenty-four hour beauty sleep, but according to her it will be best if you take your time to remember things on your own, otherwise you might get... overwhelmed. You had a huge panic attack earlier, and she was very concerned."
Yuuri shuddered as he remembered that moment when he'd lost his mind for a minute or two, and he decided that yeah, fair enough, maybe he needed to take it easy.
"Alright... But can you fill me in on some details, at least?" Yuuri pleaded. "You're telling me I'm missing over a year of memories, but I did hit my head at the Grand Prix Final? Does that mean I made it to another one?"
At that, there was a flicker of fondness in Minako's eyes that instantly made Yuuri feel warm inside. "You did, and let me tell you, you by no means messed it up this time."
Yuuri raised his eyebrows, not following. "So you're saying I failed to do a jump so badly that I ended up in a near coma, but I still got a decent score? Did they add me dramatically passing out on international television to the presentation score?"
Snorting, Minako shook her head. "No, you silly boy. You finished your program and won silver, fair and square. The accident happened later, at the end of your exhibition."
"Wait, silver? Me?!" Yuuri repeated in shock, gawking at her.
"Yes, you. Let's leave it at that for now, you have to remember on your own, doctor's orders." She reminded him.
Giving up, Yuuri let out a frustrated groan. "Fine... One more thing though?"
"And what's that, Yuuri?"
He shrugged. "I take it Celestino isn't my coach anymore, since he isn't here and you pulled your brooding face when I asked about him. So... who was?"
Minako watched him intently, her inner struggle clearly visible to Yuuri who'd known her since he was a child. He wasn't fooled that easily.
She almost smiled when she answered him. Almost.
"I was."
~~~
Suffering from severe headaches in the days that followed, Yuuri allowed his sister and his friend to take the wheel from there. Once the bandages were gone and his doctor confirmed that he was stable enough to travel -by now he'd learned that her first name was Josefa-, Minako announced that they were going home, home being Hasetsu. With Detroit being the last place where Yuuri remembered living, in a tiny apartment that he shared with Phichit and a bunch of hamsters, he needed to adjust to that idea, but he went with it.
He had missed home a lot, and if what he needed was a calm environment without stress, his hometown would meet those standards, for sure. It only made sense though, that he'd decided to go back to Hasetsu and made the Ice Castle his home rink when he'd left Celestino and opted to train with Minako instead.
Tired and under the influence of some painkillers, Yuuri left the hospital late at night via a backdoor in case there was any lingering press, Minako and Mari at his side as they got into a taxi. Exhaustion taking over, Yuuri hardly remembered getting to the airport, and he slept away most of the flight back to Japan.
After Minako dodged a stray reporter by using her scary voice, they took a taxi from the airport again; Minako and Mari were determined to save him from public transportation, which Mari claimed would give a person headaches even on a good day without a head injury. She wasn't wrong about that.
Getting back to Yu-topia was strange, to say the least. Naturally, Yuuri's mother and father welcomed him with open arms, but Yuuri had the odd sense that there were things that he needed to do. Things such as apologize for staying away for five years. And paying his respects to Vicchan. But he'd already done all of that, according to his family; of course he had, he'd lived here for the past nine months for crying out loud, he simply didn't remember.
Getting somewhat dizzy again, he declined when his mother offered to make him her famous pork cutlet bowl, excusing himself to his room, telling his family that he wanted to unpack and get some more rest.
Another warm hug, and his mother waved him off with a soft "of course, we understand, dear."
In all honesty, Yuuri was feeling out of place. Like he'd been dropped in the middle of a stage to be the lead in a musical, without knowing what the script was and without the ability to even sing to begin with.
He needed some time to gather his thoughts, and after saying goodbye to Minako, he made his way upstairs.
The first thing that caught his attention when he flicked on the lights in his bedroom, were the walls. Or more specifically, the lack of posters there. He last remembered his room to basically be a Victor Nikiforov shrine, but it was all gone. Over the past year, he must have made the decision that he was becoming too old to keep the merchandise any longer.
"Probably not a bad call," Yuuri mumbled to himself, dumping his luggage on the floor; he'd unpack later.
His plan was to fall face first onto his bed and stay like that for an undisclosed amount of time, but he was stopped when his gaze fell on his desk.
Ah, so not everything was gone, then. Carefully, he picked up the framed picture of Victor Nikiforov. Victor was smiling at the camera, but it looked like a spontaneously taken photograph rather than a standard promotional picture, his smile too happy and carefree for the latter. His blue eyes were sparkling mischievously, but there was evident affection gracing his features as well. Victor's face took up most of the image, but from what little background Yuuri could see, it was taken on a beach.
He didn't remember where or when he'd gotten that one, but chances were that it was another gift from Yuuko. He made a mental note to visit her soon.
There was a knock on the door, and he put back the picture as he called a quiet 'come in'.
His sister came in, leaning against his doorframe, and Yuuri sat down on the edge of the bed, curiously glancing up at her.
"Just making sure you're alright," she clarified, even though he hadn't said a word yet; one look was usually all it took for the two of them to communicate.
"I am, no need to worry. I have to get used to everything, that's all. I guess it's disorientating when parts of you are suddenly... missing."
She nodded at his explanation, but her eyes were intense, scrutinizing. "Let me know if you need anything. Or if you remember something, anything at all."
Mari turned to leave, but Yuuri hurriedly blurted out "wait!"
"Hmm?" his sister encouraged him to keep talking, arching an eyebrow at him.
"Was it true, what Minako said? Me winning a silver medal, I mean? You guys aren't protecting me because you're afraid that I'll freak out if you tell me about another failure, are you?" Yuuri decided that he needed to face his fears head on if he wanted to get some of them out of the way.
"Oh that, it's true alright," she confirmed without any signs of hesitation. "Check your suitcase."
Yuuri did as told, kneeling beside his luggage. He unzipped the large black suitcase, and sure enough after digging through some training outfits and pajamas that were in desperate need of seeing the inside of a washing machine, he found it. A shiny medal, the real deal. Despite everything, his face lit up.
"Wow," he whispered as he held it up in front of him.
"I even saved this," Mari announced, kneeling down beside him and shoving her phone in Yuuri's face.
It was a hastily taken picture of the official score board with the final scores, a bit blurry, but sure enough there it was:
#2 - Yuuri Katsuki - Japan
His eyes gliding over the other names and scores, he found out that he'd only missed the gold by an inch. Yuri Plisetski... Yuuri knew that name, he'd been very popular at the junior competitions. Looked like he'd had one hell of a senior debut, then.
It was only when Yuuri finished reading the list that he realized that something was alarmingly wrong with it, and that was the fact that Russian legend Victor Nikiforov wasn't on it. Yuuri had half assumed that the one taking the gold had been Victor, as per usual, but he hadn't even been there?
He looked up from the phone and blinked at his sister, shocked.
"Did... Did Victor Nikiforov retire this year?" he whispered, not liking that idea at all.
Mari looked flustered all of a sudden, and her face twisted into something that Yuuri couldn't quite label. Guilt? Fear? Worry? A combination of all of those? It lasted several seconds, and then she composed herself, getting up from the floor and shaking her head.
"He-" she paused, clearing her throat. "He decided to take a break to focus on other... things. He's recently announced his comeback though, so no need to worry about it."
"Oh..." was all Yuuri uttered as he watched his sister leave the room, this time for real.
Victor Nikiforov had taken a break? At random? To do other things? What things?
Yuuri searched his suitcase again, this time for his phone, hoping to do some research. He kept in mind the warning that he needed to remember stuff on his own, but surely looking up some information about his celebrity idol wouldn't be a problem.
Except his phone wasn't there. Minako probably still had it? He'd ask her about it in the morning, it was getting late anyway. When he quickly searched his room for his laptop to use that instead, it wasn't there either. And alright, that was suspicious, as if they'd made his own room Yuuri-proof so that he wouldn't go snooping where he shouldn't be. He huffed, annoyed, but his head was bothering him again after a long trip, and it was nearly midnight.
He'd confront people tomorrow. For now, his bed was calling to him.
He opened his closet, finding some old pajama pants to put on. He picked the first t-shirt he saw on top of a pile, a black one, frowning when he identified it as a shirt with a V-neck. He didn't remember owning one of those, but then again, what did he remember these days? He put it on without giving it any more thought, finding that it was slightly too large on him.
That was when a faintly familiar scent invaded his nose, hitting him like a ton of bricks. A scent that Yuuri automatically associated with comfort, and good, and home. But then it gradually shifted, turning into longing. And missing. Perhaps even loneliness, or sadness.
Yuuri attempted to fight the abrupt ache in his chest, but it wouldn't be tamed. Whatever was going on here, it was hurting. A lot. Curling up on his bed on top of the sheets, Yuuri stared blankly ahead, a silent tear running down his cheek.
What was wrong with him? One minute he'd been fine, the next he felt as if someone had ripped out a part of his very soul. As if there was some all consuming black hole in his chest, as if some essential part of him was missing.
Was this what it was going to feel like to try and remember on his own? Because in that case, Yuuri didn't want any of it. He inwardly debated whether or not he should take off the shirt that had started it all, but somehow, he couldn't bring himself to get up and do it. Because that scent was pain, yet comfort. That scent was something he needed to hold onto, even if apparently it had let him go.
Sleep didn't come to Yuuri for a long time, but when it finally did, he heard familiar words echo in his mind. Words that he was certain he'd heard before while floating in that foggy space between being awake and falling asleep.
'Sweet dreams, my sleeping beauty.'
Yuuri knew that he was only indulging himself when imagining these words being said in a Russian accent. He was already too drowsy to recognize the reply that he reflexively mumbled to the voice in his head.
"Good night, Vitya."