Chapter Text
“Because that is what I believe—that second chances are stronger than secrets. You can let secrets go. But a second chance? You don’t let that pass you by.”
-Daisy Whitney
-i-
Javier was relieved to return to Toronto just a few days into the new year. Spain had been... stressful, to put it mildly. He was pretty sure the only thing that got him through it was the high of finally winning the Grand Prix Final and messaging Yuzu as much as the time difference allowed.
Things were awkward at home. He didn’t know how to act around his family. Before coming back to the past he’d been on the outs with them.
He still remembered how it felt when Laura took Isabel’s side in the break up, and then how she was so critical and unsupportive of him. He had been struggling and it felt like she just kept kicking him when he was down. He realized that she probably didn’t mean to. She had always been a good sister before that. She was put in a tough position when his relationship with one of her best friends ended, and it wasn’t unreasonable for her to look at the situation and evaluate who was in the wrong for herself. It wasn’t... he knew she wasn’t choosing Isabel over him, no matter what she accused him of believing. He knew she just wanted to stay neutral in the matter, but the truth was that she couldn’t, it was impossible to, and Javier ended up being hurt.
Or maybe it was possible to stay relatively neutral and she just hadn't been doing it. She didn't need to bring up how he was to blame any time the topic of the failed relationship arose. She didn't need to keep saying this is why your relationship failed. She could have just shut up about his relationship. Sometimes it felt like she had acted like he did something horrible like cheat and she was holding it against him.
Javier was pretty sure Laura was just angry that her friend got hurt and was taking it out on him, but he didn't think that made her right. She was acting like he wasn't also hurt by what happened.
As for his parents... they hadn’t really been much better. They were on his side regarding the breakup, but after he started fighting with Laura, it felt like they thought it was petty and he just needed to grow up and get over it. Maybe they were right and it was petty. Maybe it was just a regular sibling spat. But he didn’t need judgment or people telling him to get over himself and apologize. He didn’t need the pressure to be the one to fix things with Laura when he was the one who felt hurt and she was the one who was mad at him for feeling that way. His feelings were valid, but it felt like no one else thought they were.
In some ways it was his own fault for not talking to his family. He didn’t tell them how much he was struggling, how off balance he felt. He never talked about the old wounds that had been reopened. He didn’t want to admit to them that Yuzuru Hanyu still had that kind of power over him. It felt pathetic. But they were his family, they were supposed to be close. They should have realized there was something else going on, that he was not okay, even if he wouldn’t say what.
Then it got worse and worse as time went on. They got upset with him for being unwilling to fix things. He argued. He, his parents, and his sister all said some hurtful things to each other when emotions were running high. Some of the things said to him... he wondered if they really thought so poorly of him. Rationally, he knew that they probably said things they didn’t mean just like he did. But he did mean some of the horrible things he said, and couldn’t help but think they must have too.
When he looked at his family now, he remembered all of that. They hadn’t done it yet, if they ever would, but now he knew they were capable of it. He knew how things could go, what they could think.
He had no closure and no way of getting it. If he hadn’t come back to the past then maybe he could have eventually made up with them. Maybe once he snapped out of his downward spiral or hit rock bottom he could have reached out and talked to them. Maybe he could have forgiven them. That was impossible now.
So his time with his family was spent trying to avoid them as much as possible. He spent a lot of time in his room and claimed he was tired. He was quiet at meals.
He wasn’t rude or disrespectful. He didn’t start fights or arguments. He didn’t want to ruin things completely. But it was hard. Laura saw him on his phone all the time and started teasing him about texting a girlfriend. He told her there was no girlfriend, he was just texting a friend, but she didn’t believe him. She kept saying with that love struck expression on his face, it couldn’t be anything else, and she started trying to look over his shoulder to see who he was texting and what he was saying.
He ended up changing Yuzu’s name in his contacts to none of Laura’s business in case she saw exactly who he was texting. He could just imagine what she would say if she realized he was texting a man. He knew if she started teasing him about having a boyfriend he would lose it on her.
It did make him consider that he had been single for a long time now. There was no one else after Isabel. He hadn’t felt like finding someone new in the previous timeline, and hadn’t even really considered it in the new one. Well, there were a few incidents that made him think wow, must be a little too long without a girlfriend, but he hadn’t seriously considered getting one. Perhaps he should.
He pondered it for the rest of his time in Spain. It could be a good idea. He spent a lot of time with his friends in Spain to get away from his family and felt incredibly alone the entire time. Those people were not his friends anymore. He was close to twenty years older than them and he felt it in every interaction. He cared for them, but he could not relate at all. They did not know him. It felt like they could never know him. He felt so alone, like the only people he had were Yuzu, Brian, Tracy, and Ghislain. Coming back in time had a price, and that was most of his relationships.
But that didn’t mean he couldn’t make new ones.
He could meet new people, make new friends. He could meet a woman and start a new relationship. It would be good to branch out and it would help with the loneliness.
When he arrived back in Toronto, the first thing he did after settling it was open up his laptop, google around to find a popular dating site since he wasn’t actually sure which ones existed at this time, and make a profile. Two days later he had a date with a woman named Veronica.
-i-
Yuzuru should have known that it was time for the fall. He knew it would come eventually, but he hadn’t really taken time to prepare himself. For whatever reason he assumed it would be later. He assumed he didn’t have to worry about that quite yet. Things were going so well.
He should have been getting ready for it. Maybe then he wouldn’t have teared up when Javi told him he had a date after Yuzuru asked him what was new.
In some ways it was fortunate he found out while he was in Japan. It gave him time to process and grieve without obviously avoiding Javi. In others it was a problem because he had no privacy. They still lived in a tiny apartment instead of the house they bought a few years from now. There was nowhere to go to be alone and cry in peace.
Everyone noticed right away. His mother immediately was on him asking what was wrong. He was on his iPod, was he talking to that Fernandez boy again? Did he do something? What happened? What did he need? His father meanwhile, looked like he had been slapped. He floundered, but ultimately left it to Yuzuru’s mother to deal with.
Yuzuru just wanted to be left alone.
No, Javi didn’t do anything, he lied. Why would she even think that? He wasn’t even texting Javi, he was browsing the internet. He just got overwhelmed, it happened sometimes. He had been under a lot of stress. All he needed was some space.
(And to text Javi so he didn’t realize Yuzuru was affected by him having a date.)
After his mother agreed to leave him alone so he could cry it out, he moved the corner of the room and curled up on the floor. He opened up his LINE conversation with Javi again and began typing. He couldn’t let him know he was upset. He couldn’t run away. He promised he would be better this time, and he couldn’t risk Javi connecting the dots if he did run.
Yuzu:
Sorry, mama was bothering me. (＞﹏＜)
How does that even work. You’re like 40. Isn’t it weird to date someone your physical age
Javi:
No worries.
LOL shut up
First of all I’m only 38
Yuzu:
You’ll be 39 in three months.
Javi:
well that’s not now
anyways, she’s 28
Not so young to be weird, but not too old for my apparent age
Yuzu:
Oh, I guess that’s not so bad.
How did you meet?
Javi:
dating site.
Yuzu:
LOL seriously?
Javi:
don’t judge me.
Yuzu:
I always judge you (￣ヘ￣)
Javi:
well I hope you give me +5 GOE when you do
Yuzu:
Stupid.
It’s +3 system now
Javi:
I break the scale.
Yuzu:
You’re right, -5 GOE for you.
Javi:
Ouch.
Yuzu:
(⁀ᗢ⁀)
Mama is bothering me again. Gotta go.
Javi:
Okay. Miss you.
Yuzu:
Miss you too.
Yuzuru locked his iPod, dropping it on his lap. He bent forward, pressing his face into his knees, and just let the tears fall. He hated that it made him cry. He felt so pathetic and weak. Here he was, crying over Javier Fernandez yet again.
He was so fucking stupid. Why was he even so upset? Of course Javi was going to get a girlfriend at some point. He always did. In the entire time Yuzuru knew Javi, these eight months in the past were probably one of the longest stretches he’d known him to be single.
Maybe that was why he was so upset by it. Javi had been single for so long that Yuzuru started to think it meant something.
Wouldn’t he ever learn? It never meant anything. It never would. Javi was straight. He couldn’t return Yuzuru’s feelings. He needed to stop getting his hopes up and reading into things that weren’t there. He needed to stop projecting his own feelings onto Javi.
Why did he constantly do this to himself? Why couldn’t he just accept things as they were? He didn’t even really need to think about it. He knew the answer. When he had hope he felt loved, and it was the best feeling in the world. He would give anything to feel it again. He would go through a thousand lows just to feel that high for even just an instant.
Yuzuru brought his fingers up to his neck and traced the inscription on the necklace Javi gave him. He could get through this. He did it before, he could do it again. He just needed a little courage.
-i-
Javier’s first date with Veronica went well. She was mature and sophisticated and treated him as an equal despite the apparent age difference. They had a lovely dinner at a nice restaurant and spent the evening learning about each other. Veronica was a junior editor at a small publishing company, but she hoped that with experience she could move up the ladder, and perhaps even work for a larger company someday. She was born in the neighbouring province of Manitoba and moved to Toronto for university, then never left. Her hobbies were reading, cooking, and taking ballroom dancing classes.
She did not follow figure skating and did not know anything about it, but she was interested in his career and did not look down on him for doing a “girly” sport. She did not look down on him for being comparatively less educated than her, either. She said different people took different paths, and she enjoyed the variety. Education was important, but not the only path in life, and it was just as respectable to chase your passions like Javier was. Veronica was wonderful, and he felt like this could go somewhere. Apparently she did too, because she was interested in seeing him again.
He saw her three more times before Yuzu made it back from Japan in the second half of January. He still missed Yuzu fiercely while he was gone, but Vernoica did help ease the loneliness he felt while waiting for him to come back, which ended up being just before Javier was off to the European Championships.
When he returned to Canada with his first European gold of the new timeline, there was a bit of an adjustment to make to his schedule to fit both Veronica, who agreed to be his girlfriend, and Yuzu in. Veronica had Saturdays and early Sundays free, but those were the days he spent with Yuzu. She was sometimes free Friday nights, but other times she had to stay at work late. Other evenings were a no-go because she had to get up at the crack of dawn for work.
Things would be fine on the weeks Yuzu was away, but the weeks he was present left Javier having to choose between his girlfriend and his best friend. It wasn’t actually a hard choice for him. He and Yuzu had both agreed that they would do their best to fix things, and making time for each other was part of that. He wasn’t going to back out just because he got a girlfriend. That would be probably the douchiest thing he could do, especially given how hard Yuzu was trying and the sacrifices he was making.
Veronica wasn’t exactly happy with him refusing to budge at all on Saturdays when his best friend was in town, but given that he was willing to spend Friday evenings with her when she was free and Sunday afternoons with her when not, it worked out for the most part.
-i-
A few weeks after Yuzuru took gold at Four Continents, Javier complained to Yuzuru about his girlfriend being upset with him for refusing to give up Saturdays, and it ended up resulting in a minor disagreement between the pair.
It was a typical Saturday. They were at Javier’s apartment, just sitting on the couch and talking when Javier offhandedly made the complaint.
“Oh, if Javi wants to spend Saturdays with his girlfriend, you can. You don’t have to spend them with me...” Yuzuru offered in response. He hated doing it, but if that’s what Javi wanted... well, Yuzuru had decided it was better to stay on good terms with him and see him less, rather than make Javi resent him because he felt obligated to Yuzuru, or get mad at Yuzuru for getting in the way of his relationship.
Javier scowled. “Were you listening to me at all?”
“Of course!” Yuzuru replied, eyes wide. “Your girlfriend is mad you’re busy with me. If you’re not busy with me, she won’t be mad at you.”
“That’s not—you’re missing the point,” Javier snapped.
“Then what is the point?” Yuzuru replied, frowning. “I don’t understand.”
“My point is that I want to spend time with you, and my girlfriend is mad at me for that, and it’s frustrating!” Javier growled. “And the first thing you say when I tell you is that you’re fine with cancelling our plans, like you don’t even want to spend time with me anymore! You just want to run away again, don’t you? Because you don’t like it when I talk about my problems. You never have.”
“I—what, no!” Yuzuru recoiled, his expression horrified. “I want to spend time with you!”
“Then why would you suggest we stop?” Javier demanded furiously. “The first time I get personal with you about what’s going on in my life and you try to get out of spending time with me! How is this any different from before? Oh, wait, I know how it’s different! You just waited until you could blame it on me so you don’t look bad.”
“No! That’s not what I was—I thought that’s what you wanted!” Yuzuru shouted, face twisted in hurt. “You said I was in the way of your girlfriend, so I said I’d get out of the way!”
“That’s not what I said!” Javier denied heatedly. “Why would you think I wanted that?”
“I—I don’t understand. It seemed like you were asking permission to stop seeing me on Saturdays, like when you asked about Sundays,” Yuzuru told him, clutching the fabric of his pants tightly.
The fight drained out of Javier. “What? No! Why would you think that?”
“I just... you said it like there was a problem,” Yuzuru muttered, refusing to look at Javier. “I didn’t want you to feel like you had to spend time with me if you would rather spend it with her.”
“The problem is with her not respecting that I want to spend time with you,” Javier explained patiently. “I was just frustrated with her and wanted to vent about it.”
“Oh.”
“So... you do want to spend Saturdays with me, right? You really weren’t trying to get out of it?” Javier asked, worried that Yuzu was the one who felt like he had to. Something had been off ever since he came back from Japan. Yuzu told him that being home had been hard and it would probably take some time for him to get back to normal, but it had been over a month and he wasn’t. Maybe it was his trip back to Japan after Four Continents that set him back, but Javier couldn’t help but feel like there was something else and Yuzu wanted to run away again.
“Yes. I like spending time with you. It’s important to me,” Yuzuru assured him seriously. “It’s good for me.”
“Yeah? What do you mean it’s good for you?”
Yuzuru licked his lips. “It’s motivating. You know that I’m depressed. I... it can be really hard to do things, you know? I just... I know it sounds lazy, but I just don’t want to. Everything seems like so much, even when I know it’s really not. Mama said in the beginning that I cannot come over unless I’m caught up with school, so it’s easier to get my school work done when I know that if I don’t I can’t see you. And now she says that I can’t come unless my chores are done, so it’s easier to do those, too,” he explained.
Warmth bloomed in Javier’s chest. It was... nice? Flattering? Javier wasn’t sure what word to use, exactly, but knowing that Yuzuru valued their time together enough that he did things he struggled with just to see him meant a lot to him. It made him feel valued in a way that he hadn’t before. It told him Yuzu was putting in a lot of effort just to come see him every weekend.
A thought struck him.
“Yuzu,” he began hesitantly, the familiar feelings of guilt welling up inside him. “Are you... when you agreed to give up Sundays, were you actually okay with that?”
Yuzuru blinked. “Um...”
“Be honest. Please,” Javier prompted, sensing the other man’s hesitancy.
Yuzuru chewed on his lip as he tried to decide how to answer. The truth was that no, he was not okay with that. He was not okay with giving up any of his time with Javi, but he was especially not happy giving it up so Javi could be with his girlfriend. For reasons Yuzuru hadn’t quite figured out, he felt a lot more jealous of Javi’s current girlfriend than any of his previous ones in the first timeline, with one exception. (Though he couldn't deny that he had always been incredibly jealous of them. Now it was just more.) Maybe it was because things felt different than last time. Maybe he was in deeper. Maybe he felt closer to Javi. Maybe it was because for the first time he felt like Javi’s girlfriend was encroaching on his time with Javi.
“Not really,” he admitted.
“Then why did you agree?” Javier asked gently. “If you said no, I would have respected that.”
Yuzuru stared at his hands in his lap. “How should I know that? I felt like I had to agree, or I was going to ruin your relationship. Besides, just because I don’t have anyone else doesn’t mean Javi shouldn’t. It’s not fair of me to monopolize all your time. I didn’t want you to feel obligated and resent me, or get mad that I was causing problems in your relationship.”
Javier reached out and cupped the back of Yuzuru’s neck, pulling him closer. “Hey, no. I like spending time with you, I wouldn’t be upset at you for that. Honestly, if you told me you weren’t okay with giving up Sundays, I...” Javier blushed, realizing that what he was about to say sounded rather clingy, but decided to persevere. Yuzu was being honest with him, he could be honest, too. “I’d have liked that. It would have made me feel like I’m important to you.”
Yuzuru’s cheeks took on a pink tint, too. He hadn’t expected that Javi would like him being clingy, and that little flame of hope he was trying desperately to smother started flickering back to life. “But your girlfriend,” he protested. “If I didn’t say okay it would cause problems with her.”
Javier shrugged. “Yeah, so? In that case the relationship probably wouldn’t have worked and we would have parted ways.”
Yuzuru tilted his head. “And that doesn’t bother you?”
Javier shrugged again. “It’s not even been two months since we got together, and it was just a couple weeks when I asked you. I’m still getting to know her. I want to try with her because she seems like a great woman, and I think we could be good together, but at this point if it ended I wouldn’t mind that much. If you want Sundays back, I’ll break up with her.”
Yuzuru’s eyes widened. “You would?”
“Yeah. C’mon, Yuzu,” Javier said, smiling that Yuzu smile of his. “After everything we’ve put into fixing things, after you’ve been my only friend since coming back... I mean, you’re my best friend. Of course I’d choose you over a woman I barely know. No question.”
Yuzuru couldn’t help but smile hearing that. Javi would choose him. Of course, he wasn’t choosing Yuzuru the way he wanted to be chosen, and his smile dimmed a bit at that thought. It was more of the usual, really. So close to what he wanted, but missing something important. It was always missing something. Why was it always like this? It hurt more to think that Javi would choose him, but not like that, than if he wouldn’t choose him at all. He was like a rational function. He could get closer and closer to the asymptote, but he would never touch it. The closer he got the more aware he was that he was not making any real progress towards what he wanted.
“So? Do you want Sundays back?” Javier prompted when Yuzuru didn’t respond.
It was tempting, so tempting, to just say yes. If he did then Javi’s relationship with his girlfriend was over. Javi would be single again. But he still would not be Yuzuru’s. He would start looking for another girlfriend. Maybe he’d find one who respected that the weekends were Javi’s Yuzu Time. He’d fall in love and they would be happy and eventually Javi would want to give up his weekends with Yuzuru. She would become more important, he would choose her, and Yuzuru would lose his time anyway. Or maybe Javi wouldn’t find someone who respected that Javi was busy with Yuzuru on the weekends, and he would grow to resent Yuzuru for making it impossible to keep a girlfriend, and demand his weekends back.
Saying yes wouldn’t change anything. At best it would buy him a little time.
Yuzuru shook his head. “I see Javi in training and Saturdays, still. Sundays would be nice, but... you deserve to have time for a girlfriend. You’re not going to find a serious girlfriend who is okay with no weekends.”
“It’s not no weekends, you’re gone for half of them,” Javier argued weakly.
“And I won’t always be,” Yuzuru told him calmly. “I’m graduating high school in a few weeks. Even if my mother wants to keep up the frequent trips back and forth, I don’t. I don't want to go back unless I have to. I want to stay here, and I think I can convince her to leave me alone for a few weeks if she won’t stay when I want to. What are we doing then? Are Saturdays still mine?”
“Of course!” Javier responded without even pausing to think about it. He was surprised to hear Yuzu say he wanted to stay in Canada as much as possible. Yuzu loved Japan and Sendai, and he found it hard to believe he didn't want to go back. Then again, Javier loved Spain almost as much, and he didn't want to go back home either.
“What will your girlfriend think about that?”
Javier winced. “...We can have Sundays those weeks?” he offered.
On the surface, the whole issue with Javi’s current girlfriend could be avoided by just moving their day together from Saturday to Sunday, but Yuzuru wasn’t actually available every Sunday, and the Sundays he was available it was usually for half the time he could spare on a Saturday. Switching to Sundays would severely cut down their time together. There was a reason they selected Saturday as their day together, with Sunday as a bonus if they were free, after all.
Yuzuru huffed. “I’ll hold you to that, but you realize that if you broke up with this girlfriend and got a new one later on when I was here every week, you’d still have to trade time with me to make time for her, right?”
Javier sighed. “Yeah, you’re right.”
Yuzuru smirked, but it felt fake on his lips. “I always am.”
“Still, if you change your mind...”
“Thank you, Javi.”
They lapsed into silence. Without conscious thought on either of their parts, they cuddled back together. Javier put an arm around Yuzuru’s shoulder, and Yuzuru leaned into his side, resting his head on Javier’s shoulder and closing his eyes.
“Hey Yuzu?” Javier asked softly, staring at Yuzuru intently.
Yuzuru hummed in acknowledgement.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes,” Yuzuru murmured. “Why do you ask?”
“I don’t mean right now, I mean in general,” Javier clarified. “You’ve been...” he paused, searching for the right word. “A bit subdued, I guess, since you came back. Did something happen?”
Yuzuru squeezed his eyes shut a bit tighter. He had hoped he was coming across as normal, but apparently he wasn’t as good at pretending as he wanted to be. Fortunately he had prepared excuses in case Javier asked. Most of it was even true, even if the primary reason was because he was still recovering from having his hopes crushed again.
“Japan was... not good,” he told Javier.
“Your dad still giving you a tough time about school?” Javier began stroking Yuzuru’s hair with his free hand, knowing the other man found it calming.
“Grandparents too, but it wasn’t just that,” Yuzuru replied, nuzzling into Javier’s hand. “I never forgot what happened the first time I won nationals, but for some reason I didn’t really process that meant I had to experience it again. It was jarring.”
“Oh fuck, I forgot about that,” Javier muttered, more to himself than Yuzuru, and tightened his hold around around Yuzuru’s shoulder.
“Yeah. I... I’m so used to how it was in other years, with people being happy I won, expecting it.” Yuzuru shrugged a shoulder. “The boos were upsetting. I forgot how badly people wanted Daisuke to win. Maybe part of me thought it would be different since I beat him both at NHK and the Final, already. I think it might have actually made it worse. But maybe I’m just not remembering last time clearly.”
“Oh Yuzu, why didn’t you mention it before?”
Yuzuru shrugged again. It wasn’t something he wanted to talk about over text, and then he found out about Javi’s girlfriend and he realized he could use it as a decoy excuse if Javi noticed he was upset. He felt a bit guilty for lying to Javi about what was wrong, but he really didn’t see any other option.
“You know you can talk to me, right? About anything.”
“Yes, I know,” Yuzuru lied.
-i-