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Viktor never failed to surprise him. Every day brought new joys, new possibilities. But the one surprise he was least prepared for came after Beijing.
Their kiss, aired on international television and live streams around the world, had marked a clear change in their relationship. No longer were there days of quiet pining, of begging with the powers that be for some kind of reciprocation from the other. Their actions had always spoken louder than their words could. And Viktor cradling his head, kissing him breathless in front of cameras and thousands of fans made things much clearer than Yuuri had anticipated.
How does one prepare to learn that their first crush, their longtime idol and now coach was equally smitten with them? Yuuri couldn’t have prepared for it even if he tried.
Sure, there were moments that it was obvious, looking at it with hindsight. But he remembered how terrifying those moments had been. Viktor cupped his cheek tenderly, held him backstage while others skated. He couldn’t have made it clearer without saying it explicitly.
So he said it with actions instead. Both the kiss, and other actions that left their sheets a tangled mess, shed articles of clothing hastily thrown over the coffee table.
Breathless and wrung out, Yuuri still could hardly believe it. But the hazy afterglow gave him much more of a clear image. Viktor was so incredibly human here. Flushed and sweaty, fetching water for both of them, along with a damp washcloth. He was a person . He was Yuuri’s Vitya here. He wasn’t Viktor Nikiforov. He was just Vitya.
Viktor’s frigid bare feet under the covers felt like home.
“Yuuri?” Viktor asked when they were both clean and drifting on the edges of sleep.
“Vitya.” Yuuri mumbled, already feeling himself drifting. He rolled into Viktor’s side and conformed to the curve of his body, tucking himself in like a fitted puzzle piece, two bodies carved from the same slab of marble.
“What would you say to changing your exhibition skate?” Viktor asked, his breath ghosting over Yuuri’s forehead, rustling his hair gently. “It’s beautiful, you’re very suited to classical...”
“Excellent pillow talk, Vitya.” Yuuri teased, kissing his bare shoulder. His exhibition skate was a rework of older skates with more than a few homages to his coach. A unique layback spin that Viktor perfected in his Junior years, and, of course, the quad flip.
The costume was borrowed from Viktor’s collection as well— one of Yuuri’s personal favorites from his early seasons in the Senior division. Viktor was a vision in it; a light, fluttery tunic-style shirt in a soft shade of blue, the glint of purple rhinestones shimmered under the spotlights in a way that Yuuri would never forget. Yuuri had scoured the internet to find something similar, finding endless forum posts about the hidden meanings behind his color choices, the cut of it. They picked Viktor apart piece by piece, dissecting every cut and flare.
Yuuri remembered it clear as crystal, when Viktor made a statement after winning yet another gold. The subtitles scrolled across the bottom of the screen after his exhibition skate was over, a joyous smile on Viktor’s face. He was asked about his costume, and with defiance in his eyes and in the set of his jaw, he explained.
“Lavender has always been a beautiful color; my intention has always been to support the people and communities who have suffered the stigma that I do.”
Yuuri’s heart leapt into his mouth. He may not have had the words then, but he understood what Viktor was doing now. Viktor’s shameless, relentless advocacy carved the way for acceptance in the sport, an acceptance that Yuuri himself now enjoyed without fear.
“I’m serious, Yuuri!” Viktor whined, his kiss-bruised lips turning downward in a theatrical pout. Yuuri laughed, nipping gently at Viktor’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Vitya. Go on?” he encouraged, pressing an apology kiss to the place he had bitten, feeling the muscle below Viktor’s skin relax. That alone was a beautiful thing, Yuuri decided without much thought. Everything Viktor did was beautiful. But the way he let go, the way his public persona melted away in private, when they were together… that was the most beautiful.
Viktor made an attempt at huffing at him, but the frown quickly morphed to a soft smile. “I wondered if you would like to try something different.”
“Something different?” Yuuri repeated, his words interrupted with a yawn. “Are you in the mood to surprise your audience again?”
Viktor laughed, a soft, sweet thing. “They’re your audience, love.”
“But I’m your skater, Vitya.” Yuuri offered his rebuttal. “You have something in mind, don’t you?”
“I… might.” Viktor chewed on his lower lip for a moment, a smile building behind his eyes. “I rewatched that video the triplets posted, back in the spring.”
“Ugh, why do you keep watching it?” Yuuri groaned, exasperated. He felt his face flush hot with embarrassment all over again, the thought of Viktor watching it at all made his ears burn. “I’m so out of shape in that video, I didn’t even land all of the jumps.”
“You didn’t need to land all the jumps to skate it better than I did.” Viktor whispered, pulling Yuuri up to meet his eye. “It’s why I came here. To chase what you left for me to find.” Yuuri felt his heart shudder with the weight of those words. There was a heaviness, an eagerness behind Viktor’s eyes.
“The way you move, Yuuri. It inspired me, for the first time in years.” Viktor continued, carding his hand through Yuuri’s hair. He should have been used to the touch by now, but it still made him melt every time. “You move like your body is making music. And I’ll never forget the way I felt, watching you skate a piece I choreographed, music I commissioned.”
“You don’t feel… like I stole it?” Yuuri croaked, a sudden pang of guilt settling like a rock in his stomach. “I never intended for it to go viral, I just—”
“Yuuri, without it, I would have given up looking.” Viktor interrupted firmly. “Without it… I would have lost myself completely.” The admission felt like too much, like everything had suddenly become clearer than it was before. What had felt like an invisible barrier between them shattered completely.
“Vitya…”
“I want to make history with you, Yuuri.” Viktor pressed on, a crystalline tear sliding down the slope of Viktor’s cheek. “If I choreograph a duetto for us… will you skate it with me?”
“We would be the first.” Yuuri breathed, “The first men to skate a duet together.”
“Yes!” Viktor nodded, his fringe bouncing and shimmering in the moonlight. “We would be the first.” Yuuri couldn’t fight the smile that crept into his features, a burning eagerness to leap out of bed and lace into his skates now .
“Yes. A hundred yeses.” Yuuri agreed, feeling his heart soaring. “Make history with me.”
The duetto was something of a side-project for the intervening weeks. Viktor spent his down time drafting a few ideas and jump combinations, alternating who lifted who, whose body was where. Nothing about Yuuri’s training regimen changed until after Rostelecom, after they had recovered from Makkachin’s accident and the sudden, almost traumatic distance between them. It surprised Yuuri, how much Viktor’s absence had weighed on him.
He had, of course, heard secondhand from Yurio what he had done in his post-skate haze, and been thoroughly embarrassed by it. But Viktor’s arms around him at the airport soothed every frayed nerve.
The skate was fully drafted when Yuuri returned home, having been Viktor’s solace during their separation.
“I wanted it to be an equal exchange,” Viktor explained during their first practice. “You know how the media will talk.” He raised his eyebrows pointedly and Yuuri understood, quite intimately, what Viktor meant.
“We aren’t exactly the standard pair.” Yuuri replied, smirking. Viktor chuckled into a gloved hand and pulled Yuuri into an easy waltz position. Viktor’s hand rested gently on his shoulder and he eased Yuuri’s hand into the small of his back.
“This isn’t how the skate will start,” Viktor admitted, a touch sheepish. “The skate will start with you on your own, like I was. In Sochi.” He lingered there, his breath heavy and slow. “I’ll join after your 4F.”
“A bold statement, Vitya.” Yuuri laughed, feeling the gentle push of Viktor’s weight and moving slowly through simple figures. He was far from unfamiliar with skating backward, but skating with a partner had him a touch shaky. “How do you know I’ll land the quad flip?”
Viktor laughed, bright and giddy. “It’s in the first fifteen seconds of the routine, I know you’ll land it no problem.”
Yuuri flushed and buried his face in Viktor’s neck. “Viktor…”
“With those gorgeous, muscular thighs?” Viktor purred playfully. “I have no doubts.”
“Vitya!” Yuuri yelped, feeling himself flush head to toe.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I’ll stop.” Viktor laughed, easing him through a few of the moves. It built slowly, their confidence in each other and their trust in their movements. Practicing the pair skate wasn’t their priority, and often came at the end of their time on the ice.
Yuuri savored the time they had together, the way Viktor seemed to melt in his hands. Viktor’s praise came easier when they skated together, it poured from his lips effortlessly.
“Perfect,” Viktor praised, and it landed warm in Yuuri’s ear. His breath was so close, huffing against his cheek as they slid through their shared movements. “You’re beautiful.” He sounded breathless, utterly and completely human . It felt surreal, like it had that night in Beijing.
It was incomparable. Even to the way their bodies moved in tandem in bed. This was entirely different, entirely new. The shared wavelength they operated within while on ice felt like nothing Yuuri had ever experienced. The warmth of Viktor’s hand on his hip as they moved, the strength in his arms as they danced across the ice together was completely unforgettable.
It was a dream, it had to be. Even when they didn’t execute a lift right, and they tumbled to the cold, damp ice, it felt like a dream. Skating with his idol, who had become his partner . A man he had stayed up far too late to watch on livestreams and on sketchy Russian websites was now holding him in his arms, moving with him on the ice.
Viktor had choreographed the skate to convey his longing for love, the terrible loneliness he had been suffering all those years; he was alone at the top of the world. Half of one soul searching out its other half; it was a plea with the universe to allow him his other half. The song was always meant to be a duet.
“Are you alright?” Viktor asked, slowing to a stop in the center of the ice. “Do you need a moment, love?”
“I…” Yuuri hadn’t realized that tears had started falling, pearling in his eyelashes. “Yes. I just can’t believe this is happening.”
“It’s real, lyubov moya .” Viktor smiled, wide and bright as the summer sky. “We’re going to make history after you win the gold you deserve.” He pressed a tender kiss to Yuuri’s lips, a gentle, unhurried thing. It set Yuuri’s heart on fire, just like Viktor always had.
The skate was beautiful, it was clear that Viktor had already crafted most of the duetto before proposing it to Yuuri. Maybe he had planned for it even before coming to Hasetsu. He had always intended for it to be skated as a pair. And Yuuri was the man Viktor chose to skate it.
How lucky he was, Yuuri thought, to be the one Viktor chose to chase? It settled warm in his stomach, a comforting weight in his mind.
The thought returned to him later, when he found two new garment bags hanging in the closet.
“They arrived while we were practicing,” Viktor explained, examining the tag slipped into the clear front pocket of the first. “This one is yours.”
Yuuri felt like he was committing some kind of grave sin as he unzipped the bag. He had watched Viktor skate in his pink costume, the material soft and silken against his body… and now Yuuri had a matching one in blue. It slipped between his fingertips, ethereal and impossible.
“It still doesn’t feel real.” Yuuri breathed, intending it to remain a private thought. “I… I mean. This. Skating the program with you.” He felt overwhelmed with it, drenched head to toe in it. He flushed when Viktor hummed his agreement. “Having a costume like yours.”
“I agree, lyubov moya.” Viktor answered, showing him an identical purple version of the pink suit Yuuri had been chasing. Silver epaulettes instead of gold sat on the shoulders, delicate chains draped over the chest and stomach. “Shall we try them on?”
Yuuri’s heart skipped several beats. “Please?” He asked, his blood rushing in his ears. He slipped into it easily, the silk laying over his body like it was a second skin. Viktor had been meticulous with his fitting measurements— his designer was more than happy (though not at all surprised) to hear that he was in need of more of the same costume.
The full-length mirror Viktor had shipped from his apartment hung on the closet door, and watching Viktor dress in the costume was nothing compared to the sight that met Yuuri’s eyes when he saw them reflected in it.
They were a matching pair, in blue and in purple. No longer standing behind, forgotten in last place and far from the podium. Here, they stood on equal ground, shoulder to shoulder. Viktor’s eyes ran the length of Yuuri’s body hungrily, taking in every detail of the costume.
“Yuuri…” he breathed, his voice barely more than a whisper. “You’re… a vision.” Yuuri barely heard him over the thud of his own heartbeat. He had finally reached that highest height, standing side by side.
“I can’t wait to see you skate in it.”
“Can we go? Now?” Yuuri asked, his heart soaring at the thought of being the first to see Viktor wear this on the ice.
Viktor laughed, tired but eager. “Let’s go.”