Chapter Text
When Yuuri Katsuki wakes up, his throat is dry and his eyes hurt to open. He’s dehydrated and so, so, exhausted, to say the least. He yawns and flips over on his pillow, hoping to maybe—just maybe—get fifteen more minutes of sleep.
Except, when he places his head to the side, expecting to feel the cushiony warmth of his cerulean bedsheets, it’s not his pillow. It’s a cold stack of papers. Yuuri sighs softly at his own realization.
He had fallen asleep mid study session again.
“Yuuri, get your butt up!” Yuuri hears a voice from behind him “You said you’d be practicing in the studio right now! Celestino is like totally blowing up your phone right now. I just checked your notifs. And… you’re still asleep? Don’t you have that exam or something today?-” Phichit—Yuuri’s kind, but often (always) overzealous roommate—calls to Yuuri from behind where he’s sitting at his desk.
Yuuri blinks his eyes open again, having dozed off once more across the desk, slowly but surely.
He groans again, turning to face Phichit—and his conveniently placed alarm clock. It hurts to turn his neck. He can feel the crick, and he sighs once more, his eyelids heavy.
9:21
“Huh?...” Yuuri murmurs softly, his hair strewn about his wooden desk, resting softly against the flashcards and study guides that sat on his desk. He had to be reading that clock wrong. He hadn’t put his glasses back on yet. They sat just to the left of him, on the desk.
Maybe it was 7:21 and Phichit had been pranking him? That was an…unlikely premonition.
“Yuuri! It’s 9:21. I thought you said that you had practice at 8:30, so I shouldn’t wait up for breakfast together. I was asleep—until like 5 minutes ago,” Phichit explains, slowly. Normally he and Yuuri ate breakfast with one another, and then lunch by themselves—since Yuuri was normally studying during lunch time.
And then, they always had dinner together—at least on the days where Yuuri wasn’t horrifically busy with practice—sometimes they got greasy takeout, and sometimes they got the food from the cafeteria. It was nice to have good company to come back to after a long day.
Yuuri sat up from his desk, slowly adjusting his vision by placing his blue-framed glasses on his nose gently. The world came into focus, and he smiled weakly in relief.
However, the second he registered what Phichit had said, and what the clock said, he more or less rolled out of the chair he was sitting in and onto the cold, hard floor. Ouch.
Oh.
This was not good, very not good.
He had woken up just a minute ago, and he’d already had two things go wrong.
And he had an exam today? Oh. Yeah he was so… so.. toast.
Organic chemistry—despite being his major because it was the only one unfilled—was not, and probably would never be his forte.
Phichit snickered to himself seeing Yuuri sprawled across the wooden floor, and Yuuri promptly stood up at record speed and stretched his arms out.
“Yeah, Phichit, because this is so, so funny,” Yuuri exclaims wryly, frowning as he shrugs.
This was horrible, terrible. This was so… so bad. He was supposed to be able to stay up all night to make sure he knew all of the content for his exam.
He had been up at 5:30. He remembered that. But, Yuuri isn’t quite sure when he fell asleep. He just wanted to do good in chemistry, so he studied…a lot.
Yuuri takes a deep, shaky breath in, and lets it out as one of the loudest sighs Phichit has heard in a long time, all while looking at the clock.
9:26
“Phichit! My exam is in,” Yuuri pauses to think, darting into the teeny tiny shared bathroom, “34 minutes! I don’t have time for practice,” he pauses once more, and Phichit can faintly hear the buzzing of an electric toothbrush, “Oh gof- Celeftino ith goinf to be so mad ath me…” Yuuri mumbles, mouth very clearly full of minty toothpaste.
Yuuri is wearing the same clothes as he was wearing the day before. Jeans, a hoodie, and socks. They feel glued to him. His feet slide gently against the tile floor as he stares into the mirror.
Yuuri brushes his unruly hair out of his face, sacrificing a shower, not without internal complaints though. He had—thankfully—showered yesterday, though taking a shower in the morning before an important event always helped him compartmentalize his thoughts.
It might be because it reminded him of his home. Japan, Kyushu, Hasetsu, Yutopia, the onsen. His mother—who was probably the most kindhearted woman on the entire planet—had always made him take a soak in the hot spring when he mentioned being nervous. The warmth of a shower comforted his thoughts and made him less weary when he was feeling like this. It reminded him of the hot springs. And today, he was feeling that certain way. Very nervous.
9:32
Yuuri still has to get dressed, and put deodorant on. He isn’t sure why washing his face and brushing his teeth took so unbearably long. But either way, he’s darting back into the room as fast as possible.
He still, in his own opinion, looks like he got hit by a bus, but it’s whatever. Who cares if he looks good as long as he gets an A on this exam.
He rummages through his drawers messily, pulling out a pair of black boxers, a grey undershirt, a dark blue wool sweater, and a pair of medium wash jeans. That works. Yuuri hopes it works.
Yuuri practically throws his clothes on the second he gets into the bathroom. He looks in the mirror, bloodshot eyes staring back at himself. He sighs softly, noticing the darkness of the bags under his eyes.
He had fallen asleep at six. It was like he blinked and then he was out. He sacrificed three whole hours of study time. And he was supposed to have private practice with Celestino Cialdini—his ballet teacher—at 8:30. It was far past 8:30. And while Celestino is typically easily forgiving, Yuuri is scared—no, terrified—of the texts and calls he was getting.
9:36
Yuuri is almost, almost ready. It takes 22 minutes to walk across campus to his next class, because his dorms are completely, unfortunately, out of the way of the rest of the campus. If he runs, he’ll probably make it on time.
He thanks some God somewhere for his stamina.
Yuuri hastily gathers his phone and his papers from his desk. He scrunches his face up in disgust at the papers on the top. They were wet with drool. He should’ve known not to fall asleep.
Yuuri doesn’t have time to be disgusted with himself right now though, so he—as fast as humanly possible—ties his sneakers onto his feet and shoves his papers into the black backpack he brings everywhere with him, leaving him holding just his review flashcards and his phone.
He checks the front pocket of his bag for his dorm key and wallet, grabs a jacket and mittens—just in case—and also grabs his ballet bag. Because when he calls Celestino, Yuuri is 85% sure the grumpy old man will have him at practice at some ungodly hour tonight, and Yuuri is scarily busy today.
9:42
Okay, now he’s ready. And 4 minutes behind schedule, but he can’t stress over that right now. He can’t afford to worry.
“Bye Phichit! I’ll see you tonight. Oh, and uh, sorry about breakfast,” Yuuri calls as he shuts the door behind himself.
Yuuri doesn’t have the time to wait for the elevator. It’s always busy at this time of day, and he isn’t willing to risk being later than he already is.
So he promptly books it down 4 flights of stairs, bags clutched tightly in hand, staring down at his flashcards. It’s a miracle he hasn’t fallen face first down into the concrete yet.
Yuuri swiftly makes his way outside of the building and onto campus. The floorboards creak under his feet and he takes a deep breath in as he exits the building.
It is at this moment, as Yuuri shuts the door behind himself, and the cold air whips against his pale face—numbing his fingertips and turning his ears red—that he realizes how utterly exhausted he is. He yawns, slowly, but still prominently.
He can’t afford exhaustion or anxiety. He has told himself this fact probably tens of times today. So he has to run.
Yuuri is jogging now, the cold air sharp against his lungs as small bouts of snow land softly atop his head, soaking into his dark hair, freezing his scalp. He’s trying to make it on time.
He knew that the professor wouldn’t let him take it later. It had been in the syllabus. Something about, “no retakes on exams unless you’re literally in the hospital”... or at least that’s what he had picked up from the thick stack of papers.
Yuuri didn’t have a doctor's note or a convenient, well proven excuse, so there was no way that he could be late and still be able to take his assessment.
He decides that he should call Celestino now, because the old man will probably send a search party out for him soon, considering that he has opened Celestino’s texts—marking them on Celestino’s screen with a little ‘read’ under each message—but still has yet to reply in any way, shape, or form.
Yuuri has never been one to be late, or to not show up. It’s unlike him in every way. Yuuri was punctual. Yuuri is punctual. Never late.
He didn’t want to draw more attention to himself than what was due.
Even last winter when he had caught the flu and was throwing up into the trash can—and Phichit had to make him a little bed on the floor because the trash can wouldn’t reach the bed and Yuuri kept waking up at ungodly hours of the night to hurl all of his food from the day prior into said can—Yuuri continued to go to dance practice, wearing a mask and excusing himself when he had to puke.
That was short lived however, because Celestino had quickly caught on and had made Yuuri take the rest of the week off.
Yuuri had complained, royally. But alas, he had accepted that there was no way he could make it through another dance practice as feverish as he was.
9:49
Yuuri quickly dials Celestino’s number, hoping that he’ll pick up the phone. His hands were a little too frozen, and full because of all of his bags, to text at the moment.
Celestino does in fact pick up, very quickly in fact.
“Ciao Ciao? This is Yuuri-” he starts, voice dripping with guilt. Could his morning get any worse? He yawns again, still continuing to jog as he stares down, phone in one hand, flashcards in the other.
“Yuuri, hi. Why aren’t you at practice? I’ve been trying to call you all morning. Are you running right now? I can hear it. Stamina is good, but it’s not everything, and it’s definitely not an excuse to skip practice–” Celestino starts.
“I’m so sorry. I overslept, but my chemistry exam is in like ten minutes, so can we talk about this later? I’m so, so sorry. I messed up…please don’t kick me out of the program?I haven’t graduated yet,” Yuuri explains.
He could cry right now. He’s probably disappointed the man who’s basically taken him under his wing, probably, is about to be late for his chemistry exam, probably, and is wholly exhausted, definitely.
“That’s fine Yuuri. You are one of our best dancers, we aren’t going to kick you out. That is silly of you to assume. You know we have a three unexcused absence policy, and you have…zero absences. We’ll talk later. Call me when you’re out of your exam, and we can reschedule. But, this is a one time thing. Please don’t miss without warning me beforehand again,” Celestino finishes, sighing into the microphone.
Yuuri mumbles a soft goodbye and hangs up. With this, he places his phone into his back pocket, and goes into a full sprint across campus. He’s breathless as he runs through campus, and recognizes how stupid he probably looks right now. His cheeks flush—because he’s both embarrassed and freezing.
Yuuri is getting closer to the building, grateful. He glances down at his navy wristwatch, taking note of the time.
9:53
He sighs softly and smiles, relieved. Seven minutes, and he’s about three minutes away—if he keeps up his pace.
What Yuuri doesn’t notice however, as he’s running, is that there is a shiny, red bicycle speeding in his direction full force. Unfortunately, the driver of the bike is just as clueless as he is, if not more.
The other man appears to realize the fate of the situation quickly, and he tries to hit the brakes as fast as possible—which proves unsuccessful.
“Watch out!!” Yuuri hears, in a thickly accented Russian voice. He doesn’t have enough time to ‘watch out’ for the bike, because as soon as the other man says that, Yuuri is about an inch away from the bike—and maybe an inch away from death—just kidding. Maybe.
When the bike hits Yuuri and he goes plummeting into the snow, he catches himself on his left wrist. That’s the first bad choice he makes. He feels his wrist go limp, and he almost—almost—cries. But he doesn’t.
Yuuri blinks his eyes back open, noticing that everything above and around him is blurry.
He looks next to himself in the snow, and sees, faintly, shattered glass lenses.
“Are you okay?! I’m so sorry!! I mean, I told you to watch out, but you couldn’t have had enough time to react,” Yuuri hears from above him, and he looks up above him.
He sees silver hair and blue eyes and a whole face contorted into a mix of concern and confusion.
And Yuuri—because he’s insane—cackles.
There is absolutely no way that his day could get any worse. One more thing onto the list of things that have gone wrong.
He snorts, and giggles, and even as the stranger—the very, very handsome stranger—pushes him up and out of the snow, Yuuri continues to laugh.
“Are you alright? Why aren’t you speaking? Oh god, did I give you brain damage? Yakov will kill me if I’m in prison–” The handsome stranger begins to speak, and Yuuri blinks himself back into a state of normalcy.
At this angle, Yuuri gets a good look at the other man. His cheeks are tinted pink against his starkly pale skin. His eyes are piercing but also soft. His eyebrows are tilted and his hair is disheveled. He looks like he didn’t take any fall damage, but the front of his body is covered in snow.
Of course Yuuri had to have been wearing his worst clothes when he ran into the most beautiful man he had ever seen in his entire life. He was regretting his mindset from earlier today.
“No I-uh…it’s okay” Yuuri has, at this point, utterly humiliated himself. This stranger—who he met around 47 seconds ago—has already seen him laugh, cry, and break his 15,000¥ glasses—that were shipped from Japan months ago, because—as Yuuri’s mother says—they just don’t make them in America like they do back home.
“Let me buy you a coffee? I really do feel bad. I shouldn’t have been riding my bike. Especially not in this weather,” and the stranger cracks a slight, heart-shaped smile at Yuuri. And Yuuri—because he is so, so, gay—just about melts, “Oh, wait. You just face planted. Are you okay? Here, let me help you up,” the stranger holds out his left hand for Yuuri to grab.
Yuuri grabs the man’s left hand with his right, grateful. Yuuri feels sparks. Sparks. This was so embarrassing for him. The other man’s hands are soft and gloved, compared to Yuuri’s bare, chapped, freezing hands.
And Yuuri actually, for the first time in a while, does want to go and get coffee with this guy—date or not. Who is Yuuri kidding? There's no way this guy could be asking him out. Maybe he does have brain damage. He’s definitely delusional. Just because an attractive person is kind, it doesn’t mean he wants anything romantic.
But, either way, Yuuri looks down at his watch.
9:55
“Oh, oh god,” Yuuri brushes his snowy thighs off with his right hand. He quietly takes a breath in, noticing how shallow his breaths have gotten since he fell.
“Are you okay? Sorry, fourth time's a charm,” Yuuri doesn’t laugh, having bent down once more, too focused on gathering his—now wet—notecards from the thick snow, “oh, was I not funny? Sorry, If you didn’t want to get coffee, that's okay,” The man looked down at Yuuri softly.
There was a hint of something other than his cold and soft gaze in the man’s eyes. He looked—pitiful?
“No that's uh, not it! We could get coffee another time but I have my Chemistry exam in 5 minutes and I’m already late, so I’ve got to go!” Yuuri shouts, all in one breath, probably.
“Wait let me-” the other man starts once more, his sharp blue eyes staring at Yuuri’s caramel ones.
But Yuuri is already gone.
It isn’t until Yuuri is entering the exam hall that he realizes three things:
One: His glasses are more shattered than he thought, one completely out of the frame, in little glass shards in the snow on the West side of campus, and the other pretty badly cracked, but still intact enough to use. So he can’t do the exam perfectly. He’ll have to hold the right side of the glasses up to each eye back and forth for the next three hours.
That was his own clumsiness
Two: Yuuri never got that guy’s number, so there's no way he could fulfill his coffee wishes.
and
Three: Yuuri’s left wrist is contorted, swelling slowly but surely.
The third thing he realizes is painful. He probably didn’t notice it in the shock of the moment. But it hurts—bad.
However, Yuuri is determined to get this exam done. He has been studying for two weeks straight nonstop.
A little inconvenience is not going to stop him at all. He had gotten tons of injuries dancing, and those hadn’t ever stopped him. Neither can this.
So he steps into the exam hall at 9:59am, sets his bags at the front of the room, and walks to the desk in the back corner of the classroom. His wrist throbs painfully and sharply with every step he takes.
Yuuri sits down at the wooden desk, waiting patiently for the professor to pass the exam out to all of the students. When she does, the words blur together for Yuuri, and his head hurts from straining his eyes to view.
His wrist is burning with pain, even in its still form, just placed against the desk. It's already begun to turn a nasty shade, contrasting itself from Yuuri’s pale skin.
He puts the glasses up to his right eye, and tilts his head in order to read all of the words. He realizes then, that people are looking at him funny.
He knows he looks stupid, but if he passes the exam, it’ll have been worth it.
It’s at this moment that Yuuri really wishes he had chosen a different major.
He groans, and stares back down at his paper.
-
When Yuuri gets out of his exam 3 hours later, his wrist has continued to turn an ugly shade of purple and he needs an ibuprofen or a tylenol or anything to relieve his pain. Bad.
And he’s hungry. His stomach growls unsatisfactorily.
Immediately upon arriving back to the dorm to get his credit card so that he can call Celestino and get lunch, Phichit looks at him and laughs.
“Yuuri Katsuki…what happened to you?” Phichit looks exasperated, eyeing his friend up and down as he scrolls his phone mindlessly.
Yuuri’s hair is damp with snow, his clothes have dried and wrinkled, and the bags under his eyes have grown.
Could this day get any worse?
Yuuri begins to take layers of clothes off, trying to preserve his warmth. He peels off his coat and scarf and his sweater, leaving him just in jeans and a t-shirt.
“Bike,” is all Yuuri musters out, groaning.
“Oh? Okay, you’ll tell me later,” Phichit squints, as if he’s observing Yuuri’s form, “Yuuri, your wrist is purple. You need to see the campus health services. I’m going to call Ciao Ciao and tell him there’s no way you can go to practice later. Also where are your glasses?” Phichit looks so concerned, and Yuuri feels bad for putting him through this much work.
“Broke… please don’t tell Ciao Ciao, I can probably make it. I made it through a chemistry exam with my wrist, and my broken glasses. I'm sure I can make it through ballet…as long as it’s not endurance training…or technical practice” Yuuri sits on the bean bag chair that Phichit had insisted on investing in months ago.
“There is no way you are going to be doing pirouettes and fouettes with a purple wrist. I will not let it happen. Celestino probably won’t either.” Phichit is insistent and firm, but Yuuri can sense the genuine kindness behind his words.
Yuuri groans. He frowns.
“Let me call Celestino at least—maybe he’ll let me come in and work on footwork without arms, if he knows my condition…” Yuuri looks at Phichit, eyes hopeful.
Phichit just shrugs, “Okay I guess,” he reaches his hand into the bowl of popcorn in front of himself, “but I still don’t think it’s a good idea. You can try, but I doubt Celestino will let you come to practice injured, even if you missed morning private practice,”
Yuuri nods, using his right hand to grab his phone out of his bag—where he placed it during the exam.
He dials Celestino, for the second time today. The phone rings for a moment, before Celestino picks it up.
“Yuuri? Did you get out of your exam?” Celestino asks, voice gruff.
“Yeah… I did,” Yuuri starts.
“Is something wrong? What time can you make it to practice? I’m free of students for the rest of the day,” Celestino asks, evidently frowning over the call.
“I can still… make it. But I think I can only do footwork…” Yuuri explains slowly, fearing the worst reaction out of Celestino.
“Are you injured? Yuuri, you know we take injuries seriously. If you’re injured, you know you’re supposed to go see the health services. If something happened to you, it would be my fault. I don’t want this to reflect poorly on me. I also don’t want you to be hurt. It might limit your abilities to dance in our spring program. Auditions are coming up for that, and Lilia Baranovskaya is directing it on the other side of campus,” Celestino carefully explains, and Yuuri knows he’s right.
“I guess I might be injured. I think it’s just a bruise though,” Yuuri may be lying through his teeth. He knows it’s not a bruise. He can’t even rotate his left wrist, let alone move it in multiple directions.
“If it’s bad enough that you can’t and won't consider exercising that part of your body, you should see campus health. And, at the very least, get ice,” Celestino insisted, “If I see you in the studio today Yuuri, I will not be very happy. You overwork yourself. You are more talented and capable than you think, and I need you to remember that. Don’t beat yourself up. Everyone gets injured sometimes,” despite the roughness in Celestino’s tone, he was still assuring and kind.
His harsh kindness was always well received by Yuuri.
When Yuuri says goodbye, and Phichit watches him press the end call button, he’s eager.
“What did Ciao Ciao say? Are you going to still go to practice? Are you coming to group practice tomorrow? We’ll miss you if you don’t. That freshman…Kenjirou I think? Will especially miss you. He watches you dance a lot. It’s sweet,” Phichit rambles, smiling.
“Celestino said that I should see campus health… I told him I think it’s just a bruise,” Yuuri elaborates, “he also said I can’t come to practice today. So I probably will see campus health,” he explains.
Phichit nods, “Can I come with? I’m so bored! I promise I won’t make a ton of noise. Oh and you can tell me all about whatever happened with that bike!”
“I guess, as long as I’m not keeping you from other things,” Yuuri smiles gently, “just let me put a new sweatshirt on, since mine is all snowy,” he explains.
“Okay! I’ll put my hamsters away, so that they don’t get into trouble while we’re out. My private one-on-one practice is tomorrow morning by the way, so I won't be back to the dorm until lunch since I don’t have any morning classes tomorrow,” Phichit emphasizes.
Yuuri nods and grabs a sweatshirt out of his dresser, and then walks into their shared bathroom.
He puts a new sweatshirt on—proving hard with his wrist, which gets caught in the fabric and leaves him in big blotchy tears—and his broken glasses on. He should call his mother after this, she could probably order him a new pair of glasses, and then he’d pay her back.
They probably wouldn’t come in time though, so maybe tomorrow he could get one of the American students who he did ballet with to drive him to the optometrist’s, since he nor Phichit had an American driving license.
Yuuri is glad he had taken tylenol earlier, because his wrist looked like it hurt. And it, unfortunately enough, did. It wasn’t as bad as it had been earlier because of the painkillers, and the throbbing was dull, but still present.
Phichit motions to Yuuri, and they both grab their keys before walking out of their dorm, on their way to the campus health clinic.