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People always assumed that it was him, or at the very least that it was mutual. It wasn’t. It really, really wasn’t.
Since he was nineteen years old he had been trying to get Tessa Virtue to agree to date him, and since she was seventeen years old she had always said no. She didn’t do it harshly, there was no intent to harm - well, there wasn’t always intent to harm - but the answer was always firmly, unquestionably no.
It was no before the first surgery - it was certainly no after - it was no after Vancouver and before Sochi, it was no in Scotland, it was no in China, it was no in the little bubble they built around themselves for two years in Montreal.
And it was no in Pyeongchang. He really, really thought he would get a different answer that time.
It has stung on more than one occasion that she preferred some of the guys she had dated over him (it wasn't just that he was biased - they weren't good enough), but he also knows that ultimately it’s her decision. He refuses to be That Guy - the one that insists that he knows what’s best for a girl over her own wishes, the one who thinks he deserves something from her, the one that would ever even think the phrase ‘Friend Zone.’ He is lucky to have Tessa in his life, regardless of the state of their relationship, and he doesn’t forget that. Ever. If he never gets the chance to really kiss her once in his entire life, he’s still going to feel lucky to have been able to hold her hand for twenty years.
It does confuse him sometimes though. Their relationship really is this strange thing that defies definition. Patch says they’re something between coworkers and soulmates, and he’s right. She’s his best friend, his business partner, his family, and, yes, his soulmate. Romantic relationship or not, she’s his soulmate, and he knows that she feels the same way about him.
In the end, it has really helped their skating. He channeled that part of himself into who he was on the ice, and it made it that much easier to cherish her during Mahler, to crave her during Carmen, to love her until his dying day during Moulin Rouge. For some skaters, performing certain programs over and over again might get exhausting and boring, but he really thinks he could perform Moulin Rouge with her at every show they did for the rest of their career.
That vague idea of an end, a finish line for them, it’s there in the future and he can’t really pinpoint where yet, but he knows it won’t be like last time. Last time he forced himself to go from wanting her all of the time to doing his best to not need her at all, which was one of his more ridiculous decisions, but not this time. They’re still going to be them whether they’re skating twenty shows in two months or two shows a year. He’s still going to call her to make her laugh just because he can and let her take unbelievably hipster Instagram pictures of their coffee when they meet up, and even when (if?) he meets someone else, she’s going to be standing with him, beside his brothers, as he makes that vow.
Ultimately, he’s okay with where and what they are.
Which is why he doesn’t realize when her no becomes a yes.
She doesn’t say it out loud, and he’s stopped asking her anyway, but when he thinks back on it later, he can see the yes painted all over her face and actions.
When he finds her asleep in his bunk as they travel overnight from Abbotsford to Kamloops, he doesn’t really think twice. Sharing a bed isn’t uncommon for them. The way she nestles herself into the crook of his neck, that’s new, but he assumes it’s because of how little space they have to work with.
Then she’s there the next night. And the night after that. And the night after that. He wonders if she’s been having nightmares again - she used to climb into his bed when that happened when they were younger, she said it always helped. He’s not sure this time, but she hasn’t had one since she started sleeping in his bunk, and he likes having her there so he doesn’t ask.
When he makes his way into the rink, the first thing he sees is Kaitlyn, in a red and white jersey, twirling on the ice to make it swirl around her hi[s. He laughs and leans against the boards. “Baby’s first jersey?” he asks.
“Yes!” she replies.
“How come I didn’t get one?”
She skates toward him. “You did. It’s over there. We all got them.”
He looks where she points and sees a familiar head of brown hair appear out of the neck of a baggy jersey that says “Virtue” on the back.
“Yesss!” He bolts for the group crowded around the boxes.
He nudges Tessa to the side with his hip. “Gimme.”
She rolls her eyes and reaches down and flings his jersey at him. He pulls it over his head and looks down. “I am a Greyhound. You may now address me as such.”
“Sooo...here doggy?”
He stares at her. “You think you’re funny.”
“I am,” she replies. “Isn’t that what you always say? That people don’t know how funny I really am?”
“I mean, that is true.”
“That’s what I thought,” the twinkle in her eye made it clear what was coming. “Good boy.”
He lets out a groan, more because of the way she had essentially purred that than anything else. She smirks at him.
“Tess, come take a picture with me!” Kaitlyn calls from the ice and Tessa’s attention is immediately redirected. She hurries off, pulling her phone out of her pocket, and Scott watches her go.
“Look at the way she abandons me,” he says, with a dramatic sigh.
Andrew laughs. “We just have to accept that we will always be second in their lives.”
“I accept nothing, let’s go,” he replies with a grin and the two men pull off their skate guards to join the girls on the ice.
Later, after Kaitlyn suggests that they perform Diamonds in the jerseys, he waits for Tess to make her way out, changed and ready for the final number. When the girls round the corner his brain doesn’t properly compute what he’s seeing at first.
“Whoa whoa, I didn’t think we decided on wearing just the jerseys!”
She laughs. “I’m wearing pants, Scott.”
He finally processes that all of them are wearing their mesh bodysuits beneath the jerseys and he barks out a laugh. “I gotta tell you, T, it does not look like it.”
“Great. That won’t make it awkward at all when I stand on top of you and stick my leg in the air.”
“Not at all,” he agrees with a grin. “You do look cute though.”
“Well, that makes it all better then,” she replies
“Just saying,” he shrugs. “I like it.”
She looks at him for a second then says, “Noted.” Then leans down to tighten her laces. He doesn’t think much of it, but later when he looks back from the table where he is playing cards with Elvis and a few of the production assistants to watch her make her way to what is rapidly becoming their bunk in what appears to be nothing but his Greyhounds jersey, the neck sliding off of one shoulder and MOIR painted largely across her back, it takes him a minute to be able to speak.
“It’s not my fault you spilled coffee on your jersey, Tess!” he calls after her. “You can’t just have mine!”
“I can’t hear you over the sound of how comfortable I am!” her voice calls out from where she has curled up under the blankets.
It also wasn’t unusual for their choreography to change as they got more comfortable with it. That’s what happens, they’re dancers, they like to make things their own.
So when she arches her back and makes sure her hips are pressed right against him as he wraps his arms around her, he doesn’t consider it particularly out of the ordinary. And because it’s who he is and it’s how they are, he then finds the need to one-up her. So the next night, he places himself closely behind her, plants his feet, and pushes his hips into hers as she pushes backward.
Then, as he’d known she would, she one-ups him again. He felt her drop all of her weight onto his leg as he slid it between her legs and throw herself backwards, so, of course, he uses all of his strength to pull her into him roughly, slamming their bodies together.
From then on it’s open season during 4 Minutes as they each try to get the other to break. They really are far too competitive for their own good.
It’s just so much fun.
She falls in Kitchener, and he just can’t resist the urge to tease her.
“Ice is slippery, T. I would have thought you’d know that by now,” he says with a grin.
She glares at him as she sits down and starts yanking at the laces of her skates. “Yeah, because you’ve never fallen during a show.”
He kneels down and bats her hands away, beginning to untie the knots carefully. “Of course I have. But that’s not what we’re focusing on right now.”
“It’s what I’m focusing on,” she says petulantly, leaning back and crossing her arms.
“Aw, come on. You’re not actually embarrassed are you?” he asks, moving to her other skate. “It happens.”
“I’m not embarrassed,” she says. “I just feel like I’m five.”
“Oh I see,” he says, leaning on her knees as he finishes untying her other skate. “You feel like you’re five so you’ve decided to act like it?”
“Yes,” she says, a hint of a smile quirking at the side of her mouth.
“You’re doing an excellent job,” he says.
She kicks him lightly and he pinches her leg in retaliation.
“It’s just..” she starts and looks up at her expectantly.
“What is it?”
“Why does it always have to be when they’re here?” she says with a giggle. “I mean, basically our whole family was here, Scott.”
He laughs with her. “That’s how it is. No matter how old we get they’re still the hardest audience to perform for.”
She sighs and reaches forward to run her fingers through his hair softly before pushing him back so she can pull her skates off. He noticed that she said ‘our’ but at this point he that they might as well be one big family. It didn’t mean anything.
The night she takes her jacket off to secure a win for the girls is almost his undoing. That taunting, evil look in her eye as she skates toward them, her hips doing deliciously sassy things, he thinks that’s part of the act. Turns out, it’s not. Turns out, that was for him. He just doesn’t know it yet.
“You’re a cheater, Virtch!” he calls after her as slides to a stop before stepping off the ice.
She smirks over her shoulder at him and calls back, “It’s not cheating, it’s playing to your strengths!”
He pushes into the changing booth next to hers and pulls his torn shirt off over his head quickly as he asks, “So your strength is your shoulders?”
“Yes. Have you seen my shoulders?”
He rolls his eyes. Though, she’s not wrong, her shoulders are pretty great. But he just lost and he doesn’t like it. Losing is bad enough on its own, but losing to Tessa is worse. “Not everyone likes freckles you know!”
She pokes her head through the cloth separating them and says, “First of all yes they do and second of all, yes you do.”
He fakes a gasp and covers his bare chest with his shirt. “I could have been naked in here!”
She grins. “Yeah, I waited too long.”
He laughs. Then he notices that her shoulders are bare of the straps of the top she wore for the previous number but not covered with the mesh of her Long Time Running shirt.
“Are you naked?!”
She winks and slips back into her partitioned area, pulling the shirt sleeves up her arms to slide it over her head.
Good god, he thinks as he starts pulling his own sweatshirt on. That number really riles her up.
She doesn’t let go of his hand as they make their way through the crowd after their speech at the Great Kitchen Party.
She stops in the middle of the dance floor and turns to him saying, “Dance with me.”
He gives a quiet laugh as he wraps his arms around her waist. “Yeah, because I never do that.”
“Shut up,” she murmurs.
“Shut up and dance with you?”
“Yes,” she replies.
“It’s really better if you sing it though,” he teases her.
“Shut. Up.” She tipsily wraps her arms around his neck as they begin to sway, her breath warm in his ear.
They dance together all the time, this is no different really. Except they’re not on the ice and she spends an inordinate amount of time with her head nuzzled into his neck, but he writes off the soft kisses he feels her place to his skin as accidental, or, more likely, wishful thinking.
She gets a migraine on Halloween.
“Tess, you shouldn’t be skating.”
“Scott, please don’t start,” she sighs, curling more tightly into a ball hiding her face from the strip of light shining in from outside of the bunk. He knew she’d refuse before the words had even left his mouth, but he has to try.
“You could hurt yourself. The last thing you need when you have a migraine is to be in seven different spotlights while spinning in circles. Especially when you’re in the air,” he replies.
“I know that. But I’m not letting all of those people down. I can’t do that.”
“Don’t be stubborn about this! It isn’t safe,” he says.
“I’m not being stubborn!”
“You sound pretty stubborn to me,” he mutters.
“I can’t not skate, Scott, and I know that you know that. And I also know that if you were in my position you would skate too,” she tells him.
“Yes, but you would be here telling me not to,” he points out.
“True, but then you wouldn’t listen to me and do it anyway, so can we please just get to that point so I can go back to willing my head not to explode?” she groans.
He sighs. “Your balance is going to be off. What if I can’t catch you?” he asks quietly.
She twists and looks up at him, her forehead crinkled in confusion. “But you will.”
“No, but what if I can’t?”
“You will,” she replies simply as if there’s no other answer.
Frustrated, he runs his fingers through his hair. “Can you at least entertain the fact I might not be able-”
She cuts him off. “Scott. You will.”
And he does.
He checks in with her constantly, especially before each lift, keeping eye contact with her until the last possible second. He murmurs words of encouragement and support as often as he can, trying to help her focus on his voice and not the pounding of the music or the screaming of the crowd.
He thinks nothing of the way she’s looking at him and holding onto him like he’s keeping her up, because, really, he is, and he doesn’t think twice about her not letting go of his hand during the goose, because of course she doesn’t, and he doesn’t consider that her collapsing into his arms - hiding her eyes from the light, silent tears running down her cheeks - before they even get their skate guards on at the end of the show to be anything more than a need for comfort from her best friend.
Without a fight, she agrees that it would be better for her to go lie down instead of attempting the meet and greet and it proves to Scott just how much pain she’s really in. He watches her disappear down the hall toward the bus with a sinking heart. He hates doing these things without her, and knowing what kind of state she’s in only makes it worse.
He does it for the fans, though, and because he knows that she’d want him to. It does bring him genuine pleasure to get to meet all of these happy faces, taking their gifts and letters, making sure they’re set aside so Tessa can see them later too. So many of them ask after her and it warms his heart. They must be so disappointed, but their only concern seems to be that she’s okay - they really do have the best fans.
Every moment he can, he’s up and checking his phone. She’s not messaging him, which really is a good thing because the light would be making it worse, and at least none of the production assistants have notified him that she’s gotten worse. She’d be annoyed that he’s having them keep an eye on her, but he doesn’t particularly care.
When he checks on her as the buses are being loaded, she’s passed out, sleeping off the pain and the medicine. He decides to take her bunk so he doesn’t risk waking her, but in the middle of the night as the hum of the bus’ engine rumbles, the kilometers sliding out from underneath him, he feels an impatient shove. He opens his eyes to see a half-wake, fully annoyed, bedheaded Tessa looking at him. He starts to ask if she’s okay but she just shoves at his shoulder until he shifts backward and she can climb in next to him.
She lets her head collapse to the pillow and immediately closes her eyes.
“Uhh, Tess?”
She grunts at him and flails a hand at his face in a half-hearted attempt to quiet him.
“Do you just not sleep alone anymore?” he mutters.
“I’m not sleeping at all right now and I don’t like it,” she responds. “Be quiet.”
“You’re awful bossy for someone who could have stayed asleep down there.”
“Oh my god, Scott, shut up,” she snaps.
He lowers his voice, whispering, “Your head still hurts?”
“No, you’re just really annoying.”
He chuckles lightly. “The charm, it’s astounding.”
She opens one eye and glares at him. He smiles at her. “Oh I’m sorry, are you trying to sleep?”
“You know what? Not worth it,” she says, rolling over to slide out of the bunk.
“You’re leaving already? The fun just started,” he calls after her quietly.
“Enjoy your night there, Casanova,” she mutters, and he hears her yank the curtain of his bunk shut after her.
He flops back down, simultaneously proud of his continued ability to annoy her so much after all of these years and sad that she did actually leave. After a moment, he pokes his head out of his bunk and whispers. “I get the point, but can I come down there?”
“Only if you shut the hell up,” he hears her respond.
From the bunk across from his he hears Elvis say, “Hey lovebirds, can both of you shut up and go to sleep?”
Wordlessly he slides down and into the bunk, pressing himself close to her and trying not to laugh. As quietly as he can he says, “Did we really just get scolded by Elvis Stojko for keeping him awake?”
So quiet that he can barely hear it, she whispers, “We just got scolded by Elvis Stojko because you are completely incapable being quiet.”
“Come on, T, revel in this moment with me. We are living a charmed life,” he says.
“Goodnight, Scott.”
“Thirteen year old Tessa would have been very excited about this.”
Finally shifting to place her hand fully over his mouth she says, “Thirteen year old Tessa would have already kicked you in the shins. Admire my restraint.”
She pulls her hand away and rolls over resolutely.
He thinks for a little while then asks, “You don’t think it’s weird that he called us ‘lovebirds’?”
She doesn’t answer and he peaks over her shoulder to see that she’s managed to drift off again. He curls an arm under his head and drifts off. His life is so weird.
The night before the London show, as they’re curled up in his bunk, her reading and him dozing lightly, she shifts, kicking his leg lightly. “You’re such a bed hog.”
“Excuse you, this is my bed. You have your own.”
She looks at him with a raised eyebrow. “You want me to leave?”
“Not really,” he says with a smile.
“Then hush,” she says and returns to her book. With a sigh, she adds, “It’s going to be so nice to sleep in my big bed for a night.”
He tries not to look wounded at her words. It was close quarters, but he’d thought it was all right. More than alright, really. And she was the one choosing to be here. He turns away from her on to his side, mumbling, “We should get some sleep.”
“Yeah,” she replies softly, tossing her book to the side and flicking off the light. His confusion only grows when she throws an arm over him and curls herself into his back.
London is beyond spectacular. Like Ilderton, this town has given them so much over the years, and they hope they can give them even a sliver of something back. Their energy is high, and he can tell by the way she moves and the look in her eye that she’s having just as much fun as he is.
Her gaze only gets more intense as the night goes on, and he marvels at her. She’s been skating for very nearly her entire life and even now, more than twenty years in, she’s giving it her all. He doesn’t notice that the most potent of her ferocity is directly only at him.
She sits next to him at dinner, again not really out of the ordinary, but she stays close, keeping her hand resting gently on his leg as the conversation among the mix of their families and friends flows around them. His mother notices and raises a questioning eyebrow, and he just shakes his head at her. But then she gives him a look that is some mixture of amusement and loving pity. He rolls his eyes internally at his mother reading anything else into it, they’ve always been like this.
Dinner ends, and they all spill out into the parking lot of the restaurant, people hugging and drifting away to their cars. A cab pulls up as the group chatters their loud goodbyes. Behind Danny he sees Tessa hugging Kate and Jordan, and notices that she’s blushing as her sister seemingly teases her about something that he can’t quite hear. Tessa shoves at her shoulder and turns away with a firm, “Goodnight.” She’s smiling and catches his eye, taking a deep breath and moving toward him.
He meets her halfway and wraps his arms around her. As he starts to say goodnight, she pulls back and looks up at him, eyes wide and confused.
Then she laughs. “Oh my god.”
“What?” he asks, his brow furrowing. She peeks around him and finds the remaining members of the Moir clan watching them. Then, to his great surprise, she grins and waves at them. “We’ll see you for breakfast tomorrow before we leave for St. Catharines, yeah?”
Alma grins and waves a quick goodbye and Danny chokes out, “Yup. Tomorrow. See you.” The rest of his family has dissipated and the two of them quickly make themselves scarce.
He turns back to her. “Tess, what?”
“Sometimes you are really stupid, Moir.”
He scoffs. “Excuse me?”
She just smiles and holds out her hand. “Let’s go.”
“Go where? Tessa, what is happening?”
She turns and looks at him with a roll of her eyes. “We’re going home, Scott. It’s late, it’s cold, and we are wasting a lot of valuable time where we could have a private, very large bed to ourselves.”
His heart stutters. “What?”
Her face softens from loving mockery to just...love. “This is what saying yes looks like.”
“What?” he asks again.
“Are you going to make me say yes as many times as I said no? Because we could be here awhile,” she replies.
“You’re saying yes.”
“Yes.”
“To me.”
“Yes,” she says.
“You’re saying yes to me,” he repeats.
“Yes,” she says with a sigh and a smile.
He stares at her for a moment. Then, “I’m sorry, I’m just not underst-”
“Oh for god’s sake,” she cuts him off and leans forward to kiss him, her lips soft but strong against his. When she pulls back, she says, “Clear enough?’
He licks his lips lightly. “Uh, yup, I think - uh -” he coughs. “I think I got it.”
“So can we go?”
“I would like that, yes,” he grabs her hand and pulls her toward the waiting cab.
After she slides in next to him and gives the driver her address, he pulls her as close as he can.
“You really had no idea?” she laughs.
“That we had started dating? No, I did not,” he answers.
“No wonder you wouldn’t kiss me. It was making me crazy. I just thought you didn’t anyone to see.”
“Yeah, no, fair warning, I don’t really care so much about that,” he tells her with a grin. He doesn’t think he’s felt this kind of lightness beyond standing next to her on an Olympic podium.
She smacks his leg lightly. “You should care. It’s bad enough the way you feel me up on the ice, you can’t start making a spectacle of it off the ice too.”
“Right, but feeling you up on the ice - that was my outlet because I couldn’t do it off ice. Now I can do both,” he teases.
She raises an eyebrow at him and he pokes her side playfully. “Ooh the patented Tessa Virtue don’t mess with me eyebrow. Yeah, you don’t scare me, kiddo.”
“You’re sticking with ‘kiddo’?” she asks.
“I am.”
“Really?” she asks.
“Yes. Why?”
Her eyes flick to the driver and doesn’t respond. But then he feels her hand sliding up his leg, moving to cup him firmly through his jeans. His entire world narrows to that one single point and she whispers, “Still wanna call me kiddo?”
“Nope,” he chokes out.
“That’s what I thought.”
In the end, he does make her say yes for every time she’d said no, but his way is much more fun.