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“You did amazing today, Yuri!” Yuri turned around to see Victor with a proud smile on his face, “I was worried about you at the beginning, but you made a lot of improvement today.” Yuri smiled as he put his skates in his bag and put on his jacket. “I did feel a little out of it at the beginning, but it feels better being back on the ice.”
They started towards the exit, hand-in-hand. They walked outside and smelled the crisp air of winter, admiring how nice it felt after skating so hard. As they continued walking Victor said to Yuri in a sympathetic voice, “It’s ok that you took a break for a few weeks. Mental health is just as important as physical health, and when it was in jeopardy you made the right decision in taking care of it.” Yuri smiled softly and nuzzled his hand more into Victor’s. He really appreciated that no matter what, Victor always met him halfway.
It had already been 3 weeks since Yuri had the worst mental breakdown he had had in a long while. All the stress of planning for the next figure skating season and Victor’s wedding had already felt like a lot, when, of course, the straw that broke the camel's back happened. While doing choreography for his free program he had gone into a sit spin. However, he had too much uncontrolled momentum going into it and lost balance. He had fallen at an odd angle and lost hold of his foot, and before he had enough time to feel the pain, he saw red coming from his hand.
Victor, Yuuko, and Takeshi had rushed him to the hospital in a complete panic. It had all felt like a blur, going to the hospital, getting stitches, being told he needed to rest. It wasn’t until they had been there for 6 hours did Yuuri really process what had happened. The stress of making new programs, the stress of planning a wedding, and now this, it all felt like the world was closing in too tight around him. Preventing him from breathing. Preventing him from thinking. Preventing him from remaining calm.
And that’s how it happened. That’s how he ended up taking 3 weeks to recover. He felt embarrassed and somewhat guilty of it for the first week. But with the help of his loved ones, and with the help of Victor, he had realized they would always be there for him to lean on whenever he needed it. The next 2 weeks were spent recovering from his injury, picking wedding suits out with Victor, and talking to the people around him when he felt like it was all too much.
Remembering Victor was holding his hand, he smiled. Yeah, he could be a complete idiot sometimes, and yes, he is terrible when it comes to dealing with people crying. But he loved him. And Yuri knew that. He paused, and Victor turned to look at him. “Are you ok, love?” Victor asked, raising one of his eyebrows in confusion. Yuri looked up at him and smiled. ‘Love,’ he thought to himself as he caressed Victor’s cheek. ‘Nomatter how high the mountain I must climb is, love will always be there to help me conquer even the most difficult of climbs.’ Victor and Yuri smiled softly at each other. They locked lips as the street lamps started to alight, and a cold breeze blew every worry away.