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Chapter Text

Yuuri no longer felt anything when he went to the kiss and cry. He sat there, tired, head leaned back against the wall, towel heavy around his sweaty neck, and he felt nothing but utter exhaustion and pain. Gone was the anxiety he used to feel at the beginning of his career, when he would sit there beside Celestino, bouncing his leg, fidgeting, biting his lip until it bled. In its place had come the numbness of too many years of repetition, of winning and losing and failing and succeeding.

He no longer felt anything after, only before.

He’d thrown up before his final program, kneeling on the dirty bathroom floor of the restrooms, anxiety at an all time high, as it often was before he hit the ice. His entire career so far had been built upon pushing himself harder and harder, striving to be better than better, because he could be, because he had to be.

All of Japan was watching, the world was watching. The expectations placed upon his shoulders were high.

He was one of the best, now, but there was always that thought that he would fail, that he would let everyone down and the world would see it, cameras all on him. His family, watching the stream from Japan, his coach, the other skaters.

He shook as he sat on the bench, hiding his tremor in the white knuckled grip he had on his water bottle. He was tired, he was always tired and his body always hurt, his constant anxiety leading up to the competitions his only distraction from how hard he was pushing himself. And his program had been difficult, one of his most difficult yet, with enough quads to push him into record breaking territory.

Celestino sat beside him, stone faced as the score was finally read. He barely heard it himself, dazed, but suddenly his coach was in his ear, voice high and excited, an arm thrown around him. Yuuri blinked quickly, looking up at the scoreboard.

“ —won gold, Yuuri!” Celestino was saying, his voice drowned out by the sound of the announcer.

“Five time consecutive Grand Prix medalist, Yuuri Katsuki of Japan, has taken his second Gold at the Grand Prix Finals!” The voice came to him as if through a fog and he sat there for too long a moment, even as his coach jumped to his feet, amazed, processing it.

He’d won gold again.

Yuuri pushed a smile onto his face and waved as the camera lingered on him, eager for his reaction. And inside he was happy, almost giddy, but he was also tired and weak from the intensity of his free program and he stumbled as he stood, Celestino catching him with a steady grip. He paused for the briefest moment, looking down at Yuuri with a concerned look but he shook his head, waylaying his worry, grinning all the more.

“I won,” he mouthed to his coach and he smiled back, laughing, slapping him gently on the back.

“Don’t look so surprised,” Celestino said. “Your programs were amazing, you were guaranteed to place!”

By the time he reached the medal ceremony he was barely able to stand, his feet aching, his legs sore and wobbly. He’d barely eaten since his plane had touched down a few days earlier for the event, and he was feeling it now, all other distractions gone except for the weight of the gold medal that hung around his neck.

He stood out on the ice with the silver and bronze winners, smiling and waving, a too large bouquet of flowers in his arms, almost swallowing his face. The world came in and out of focus, made worse by his lack of glasses, and he was dizzy from the flashing of the cameras, the loud voice of the announcers, the frenzy of the audience looking on.

He wondered how bad he looked, in the pale reflection of light from the ice rink beneath his feet, in the light of the cameras. He’d had circles under his eyes when he’d woken that morning, had spent too long applying a careful layer of foundation over it, blending it out until he looked somewhat normal. Presentation was important to the judges, to the world watching him and judging him.

But he was sweaty now, and tired, a fine tremor running through him as he waved and went through the motions. His hair was beginning to fall from its careful grooming, coming to settle about his eyes and about his face as it did normally, messy.

But his smile was genuine and real and he felt on cloud nine as he finally skated back to the edge of the rink, practically falling into Celestino’s arms, ecstatic as he was weak.

Later was the press conference and he was ushered to it from the rink as fast as could be and he sat, thankful for the ability to hide behind the table and a microphone, less exposed to the world and the flashing cameras.

“What’s next for you?” a reporter asked, seated in the front row, and he frowned and considered it himself.

He had no answer. He’d thrown himself into the sport when he was too young even to know what he was really throwing himself into and now, here he was, one of the best in the world.

He’d won too many medals to count and he felt anxious at the thought of not skating anymore. He didn’t know what to do with himself without the ice. It was all he had known, it was all he was really good at.

At the lingering silence, the reporter pushed him. “Do you have plans to compete again next season? Do you have your eyes set on the World Championships again this year?”

He blinked, startled. “Absolutely,” he said slowly, turning the words around in his head, over analyzing them as he always did before he spoke. He’d been at four so far, and he was sure to be Japan’s top pick again, maybe. Hopefully. “I’ll be competing in the next season, and I expect it to top even this one.”

From the sidelines Celestino shot him a curious look and he ignored it, smiling.

“My best years are yet to come,” he finished, leaning back from the mic. And he truly felt it, because what else was there for him?

He could always be better. There was always room for improvement.

His brief conference was all anyone was talking about as they finally left, his tired face plastered on every screen in the arena lobby. “My best years are yet to come,” echoed from every corner, and he walked along beside Celestino, focusing only on putting one foot in front of the other.

The crowds had long since left and it was just him and his coach and the other competitors finally leaving, all of them in tracksuits, bags hefted onto their shoulders. Celestino held his bags for him, and Yuuri was thankful.

A figure stepped into his periphery and he looked up, startled to see one of the Junior Competitors stopped, glaring over at him.

Yuri Plisetsky. He’d taken gold. It was his last Grand Prix before he was eligible for Senior Division.

His brown eyes met Yuri’s bright blue ones and he froze, suddenly anxious again out of nowhere. He’d run into Yuri as he’d left the bathrooms before his program, stumbling and anxious, on the tail end of his pre-competition panic attack. The kid had taken one look at him, his pale face and tear streaked cheeks, and sneered, turning his nose up at him as he walked passed.

Celestino stopped too, looking him over with concern. “Yuuri?” he began and Yuuri snapped out of it, breaking eye contact.

“Sorry,” he said quietly. Falling into step again with his coach. “I’m coming.”

A taxi was waiting for them outside, to take them to the hotel, and Yuuri sat in the back seat, gazing out at the street as it whirled by. He’d finally gotten time to slip his glasses on but the lights were still spots of blur through the light sprinkling of rain coming down in the waning light from the coming dusk.

Beside him, Celestino kept looking over as if to say something and Yuuri waited, preparing himself mentally for whatever was on the man’s mind.

“Listen, Yuuri,” he finally started, turning slightly in the back seat to better look at him. Yuuri refused to meet his eyes. “Maybe you should reconsider this next season. Take a season off.”

Yuuri froze in his seat, curling his fingers together in his lap.

“You’ll be finishing college soon, after all.” His coach’s voice was uncharacteristically soft and it hurt Yuuri all the more, the gentle demeanor that told him his coach was hesitant to say what he wanted, for fear of upsetting him.

That’s how he was, the way others saw him. A world renowned figure skater, an anxious mess in the times in between.

At his silence, Celestion cleared his throat and plowed onward. “You've been pushing yourself too hard lately, your free program was beyond words but after —” He paused, dropping a hand onto Yuuri’s shoulder. “You’re pushing yourself too hard,” he said again.

Yuuri chanced a glance at him, at last, shrugging out of the man’s grip. He plastered a smile onto his face but he didn’t really feel it. “Really,” he said. “I’m fine. I’m not pushing myself too hard.” And if he stopped now, he might not return. He was too close to his peak age, too close to the typical age for retirement to take a season off now. He couldn’t.

And maybe it was a lie, but pushing himself helped with everything else. He practiced all the time, during his time with Celestino, in secret in his free time. And skating was cathartic to him, a way to push off all the anxiety, all the stress of everyday and lose himself in something beautiful and creative.

He didn’t just push himself because he felt he had to, too many expectations rained down upon him, but because he wanted too, because skating had become everything to him.

Celestino sighed and looked away, finally. “Alright,” he murmured. “Just think about it.”

Yuuri didn’t.

-

He facetimed with Phichit while he prepared for the banquet. It was in less than an hour and Yuuri had had just enough time to shower and do his hair once arriving at the hotel. He sat on the edge of his hotel bed while he laced his shoes, Phichit’s voice washing over him, excited.

“Another gold, Yuuri! I’d say I can’t believe it but I totally can. I watched the whole event live and your programs were the best, the best . Yuuri! You were fantastic!”

His longtime friend hadn’t placed to make it to the finals and had ultimately decided to remain back in Detroit instead of attending as a guest. But even with his limited amount of time, Yuuri wanted to speak to him.

His voice was a welcome familiarity against his nerves as he prepared to leave.

Yuuri finished with his shoes and picked up his phone, bringing his face back into view of the camera. He grinned wide and Phichit smiled back. “T-thanks,” he said, scratching at the back of his head. “I did alright, didn’t I?”

And Phichit laughed. “Yuuri, you’re too hard on yourself. You just won gold !”

“Yeah, I won gold,” he echoed.

Celestino called to him from the adjoining room and he looked up as the man poked his head in “The taxi will be here in five,” he told him, beaming. Gone was his concern from before. He had let it go, for now, it seemed. “Are you sure you’re up for attending tonight? No one will blame you if you decide not to—”

Yuuri shook his head, interrupting him. “No, no. I’ll be out in a moment.” But Celestino had been pressing something upon him that was unspoken with his concern. Yuuri only rarely ever attended the banquets, but this year seemed as good a time as any. He’d won his second gold, it wouldn’t look good if he didn’t attend.

He bid goodbye to Phichit and stood, at last, moving to glance at himself in the bathroom mirror. He looked as tired as he felt, hair slicked back, face pale beneath the bathroom fluorescents. He’d lost a bit of weight since he’d last had cause to where the suit he’d chosen and it was ill fitting, hanging almost loose from his frame.

He looked down at his glasses, which he’d cast aside while getting ready, considering them. His vision wasn’t so bad that he couldn’t make it through the night without them, but he grabbed them anyway, sliding them onto his face and bringing his appearance into better focus.

He looked rough, but it would have to do.

—

They arrived a bit late, Celestino practically dragging him in. The man himself seemed rather excited to be there and he parted ways from him the moment he had finally decided Yuuri would manage without him.

All of the other skaters were already there with the exception of the select few who enjoyed being more fashionably late. In one corner, the junior skaters huddled in their own group, Yuri Piletsky among them. They made the briefest amount of eye contact across the room and Yuuri looked away, pushing the kid from his thoughts.

There were hors d’oeuvres set up, and a long table covered in delicate flutes of champagne. He made his way there first, grabbing a flute and downing it for his nerves. He grabbed a second one to get him through the rest of it and set about mingling.

Everyone stopped to speak to him, once they realized he was there, offering their congratulations and kind words and he made dreaded small talk for what felt like ages, thankful for the alcohol.

He was grateful for the praise, too, but humble and awkward throughout all of it, despairing a little more every time a new stranger approached him.

He’d made it through almost three flutes, his cheeks flushed, by the time he was able to pull himself to the corner and away from the crowd for a brief moment. It didn’t last more than a few minutes before he was approached by yet another person and he plastered a weak smile on his face, forcing eye contact, as was polite.

The man was different than most of the other sponsors floating about, tall and elegant in a way that reminded him more of the other skaters. His hair was short and silver, eyes a pale, gray-blue, and he smiled a smile that made Yuuri’s knees weak.

And there was something familiar about him that Yuuri couldn’t quite place, a feeling of almost nostalgia looking at him that stirred something—

He blinked, eyes going wide. “Victor,” he said. “Victor Nikiforov.”

The man smiled wider, extending his hand, and Yuuri fumbled his champagne from one hand to another in order to shake it. “You know me,” he noted. His English was flawless, his Russian accent thick and delicate. Yuuri briefly thought he might faint to have the man standing before him.

“Yeah,” he said, throat tight. He swallowed down the nerves, his whole body feeling suddenly light and flush. The champagne was beginning to make him light hearted. “You were my idol, you’re the reason I became a skater.”

Victor stepped closer, closing what little distance was already between them. “I’m aware,” he said playfully. His voice was the epitome of charming, his posture inviting in a way that made Yuuri blush deep.

He opened his mouth to ask how he could know such a thing, but he was beaten to the punch. “You gave a rare interview to a major magazine a few years ago, I forget which one,” Victor told him, smirking, taking a small sip of his drink. “They quoted you on that.”

Victor had been the leading figure skater in the world, from the time he was in Junior’s until he had graduated into the Senior division. He was still heralded as one of the greatest skaters to ever touch the ice and Yuuri had grown up watching him skate, had taken notes, had strived to be as good as him.

And then Victor was injured, had gone down during a Grand Prix final, performing a jump he had performed hundreds of times before. Yuuri knew, because he’d watched every one of his performances.

It was a fluke of bad luck, a legendary skater pushing himself too hard, flubbing a jump in the worst possible way. He’d come down wrong and damaged his knee.

He’d been practically carried off the ice.

And Victor had been a shoe in for his fifth medal, likely a gold. He’d been an Olympic hopeful, was set to compete in his fifth Worlds. He’d been almost the age Yuuri was now. He’d done one more season, not placing for the Final again, and then he’d quietly retired, unable to return to what he had once been, before his injury.

Yuuri had watched that final season with growing sadness to see such a talented skater taken out so early.

And now the man himself stood in front of him, smiling flirtily, champagne flute held lazily in one hand. He looked different now, hair shorter, his suit neat and well tailored, but he wore the same personality he always had on the ice.

“I have posters of you on my walls,” Yuuri said idly, without thinking, and then immediately turned bright red, realizing himself and the looseness that had come to his tongue in the wake of too much champagne. “I mean—”

Victor laughed and it was the loveliest sound.

Yuuri cleared his throat and tried again. “What are you doing here?” he asked, casting his eyes about the room. Everyone seemed to be ignoring them, leaving them alone in the corner Yuuri had tucked himself into and he almost prayed for someone to come over and interrupt, to save him from making a fool of himself in front of his idol.

“Ahh,” Victor murmured, tilting his flute ever so slightly in the direction of the junior skaters, where they had awkwardly gathered together. “I’m Yuri Plisetsky’s coach,” he told him. “Such a handful, that one, but I’m sorry to say this will be my last season coaching him.”

Yuuri frowned. “He won gold,” Yuuri said, looking to where the Russian Yuri leaned against a wall slightly away from the others, scowl on his face. He looked to be having the worst time imaginable. “Has he— Has he fired you?”

What an inappropriate question to ask and Yuuri immediately bit his lip, regretting it.

Victor didn’t seem to find it intrusive at all and shrugged, making an almost funny face. “In a way. He’s making his Senior debut soon enough and he needed a change. I’m hardly bothered, I’ve been his coach for quite a while. Henceforth he’ll be training with my old coach, Yakov.” He took another sip of his champagne. “But let’s not talk about that, let’s talk about you , Yuuri Katsuki.” He leaned further into Yuuri’s personal space and Yuuri almost dropped his glass in surprise. “You’ve won another gold. Congratulations.” He practically purred it.

“T-thanks,” Yuri stuttered out, finally averting his gaze. He raised his glass to his lips for the sake of doing something and nearly choked as Victor continued.

“You’ll surpass me soon.”

Yuuri raised his hands, shaking his head wildly. “Never,” he said, bewildered. “I’ll never be as good as you, never—”

Victor smiled softly but his eyes looked almost sad, suddenly. “Yuuri Katsuki, cool and aloof, world famous figure skater, Japan’s best . You’re different than I expected, in person,” and Yuuri felt faint at his words, felt, finally, the edge of a panic attack coming over him. “But cool and aloof isn’t quite right, is it?

Slowly Yuuri moved his free hand up to cover his heart, grasping at the loose material of his suit there. He played it off as a nervous gesture, taking slow, deep breaths through his nose quietly, trying to calm himself.

That’s how the world saw him, the magazines, the media, the other skaters. He only rarely went to after event banquets, kept to himself, didn’t engage with the others. He wasn’t a mingler, and people noticed that. But Victor saw through that, Victor—

“You’re just shy,” he said and Yuuri’s breath caught in his throat. “And awfully modest.”

He shrugged and looked away, quietly relieved. Inside he was a mess, shy only through his own nerves, his falling apart at the seams. Victor was unfazed by his awkwardness, seemed almost endeared by it.

But his eyes were still on him, sad all the same, and Yuuri felt more self conscious than ever under that gaze. Victor seemed to consider him for a long moment and finally leaned in, swiping a finger across his cheekbone, more prominent than usual, a hair’s breath beneath the dark circles under his eyes.

“A bit of advice,” he said softly, lips barely moving. “Take it easy. Don’t push yourself too hard.”

And then he pulled away, the warmth of his touch noticeably absent from Yuuri’s cheek in the wake of it

Yuuri drank enough after that he didn’t remember anything past Victor’s thumb sliding across his cheek.

Chapter Text

A few weeks into the semester, he fell.

He was practicing too hard, going too fast and performing his jumps too high. He still had no choreography planned for the coming season, no ideas in place, no thoughts to what his music would be, and so he’d been practicing more and more, experimenting with different move sets, with different jump combinations.

And so when he didn’t hesitate to jump a quad he’d landed before, more times than not, he went too high, rotated not quite enough. He knew before he landed that he wouldn’t land right and he came down awkwardly on his foot, his ankle turning with the force of it, his leg attempting to go in a different direction, sending him sprawling.

He collapsed into a heap with a thud, pain shooting through his ankle, his legs going out from under him.

The thud echoed loud throughout the rink, the few other skaters out on the ice this late at night turning to stare, a few of them heading his way.

But Celestino was by his side first, kneeling down and helping Yuuri struggle upright. He gasped, fingers digging tight into Celestino’s arm, and he swore in Japanese, tears springing to his eyes.

It took him a great deal of time to finally remove the skate once they finally got him to the bench. Every unstrung lace sent more pain through him and he did so with increasingly shaky hands, refusing Celestino’s help. He finally, after a few minutes, stepped aside to make a phone call and Yuuri watched him through bleary eyes, mind too fogged with pain to make out the rapid fire English he was speaking.

Pulling the skate off was the hardest, sent the most pain through him as it dragged across his ankle, still not loose enough. He let it fall to the ground, throwing his hands down to edge of the bench, catching them in a white knuckled grip. He hung his head in shame as tears finally dropped, gasping with the pain of it.

He’d had plenty of minor injuries through the years, sprains, even a fractured wrist once, from landing funny when he had been younger, but this was the worst.

Celestino came over, squatting before him so they were at eye level. Yuuri refused to look at him, hand now pressed against his mouth to try and quell the coming sobs. “You’re going to the hospital,” Celestino said grimly and Yuuri frantically shook his head.

“No, no, it’s not that bad— It’s probably just a— just a sprain,” he gasped out, desperate. It wasn’t just a sprain, he knew it, but he couldn’t face the reality of it. He couldn’t bear the thought of knowing what it was.

He didn’t cry because it hurt, he cried because this could be the end of his career.

—

“Clean break to the fibula,” the doctor told him later, adjusting his glasses. He looked ghastly in the faint glow from the x-ray reader, like something from a nightmare. Fitting. “We’ll get it set, fit a cast. We’ll get you into rehab, after. But we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

For two months he’d have to wear the cast. Three months of rehab, after. He’d be out of commission for almost 6 months.

He felt ill, later, as he curled up in his bed later, sobbing. He hadn’t dared to ask whether he could ever skate again, couldn’t stomach the answer to that question. But it had hung in the air between him and Celestino as the man had helped him hobble from the emergency room on his new crutches.

Probably, but not easily. Not for a while at least.

He was almost 23, his career was already nearing its finality just from his age, and the thought that this hindrance might bring to an end what could easily be one of his last seasons sent him into a downward spiral for the rest of the semester.

His grades didn’t suffer, thankfully, but he stayed in his room in the times between classes, curled in his bed. He cried often, his panic attacks coming more frequently, but at some level he was still in denial, determined that this couldn’t be the end of the season for him. The Grand Prix was too far away, still, to have any certainty one way or the other.

Maybe he could still make it.

And so at other times he sampled songs, jotting scribbles in the margins of his notes, ideas of jumps, for movements. But it wasn’t enough. He had months more to go before he could set foot on the ice again.

He had Phichit, who helped him through it, an unwavering light of hopefulness and joy, but in the times between, when Phichit was in classes or at practice, which was more often than not, he let himself break down.

Celestino visited sometimes, but mostly only called to check in on him.

Eventually his cast came off, and with it the real test of whether or not he would ever recover enough to skate again.

By the time the semester drew to a close, he was barely a month into rehab, growing increasingly frustrated by his struggles there, by how slowly he was improving. “It takes time,” the therapist told him, “You broke a pretty important bone. You won’t be back to where you were overnight.”

It didn’t help. His ankle still hurt, though he’d been cleared to walk on it, and it only hurt worse with the rehab.

“I’ve decided to go home, to Hasetsu,” he told Celestino a week later, when he called to check in. “When the semester is over. I need to—” he sighed. “I need to reassess what’s next for me.” Celestino was quiet for a long while on the other end and Yuuri could sense the quiet relief from the other man in the lingering silence.

—

He flew home less than a week later and he arrived tired and jetlagged.

Minako picked him up from the station, pulling him into a tight hug the moment she saw him. “Yuuri,” she breathed. “You’re home.”

He wanted to cry, to curl into her and sob out all of the anxiety he felt, the anguish at his injury. But he didn’t. He just curled his hands tight against her jacket, instead, and relished in the comfort her hug brought.

When she finally pulled away she stood back, eyes roving over him. He’d always been most comfortable around his family and his long time friends, but now he suddenly felt self conscious beneath her gaze.

“You’ve lost a lot of weight,” she said softly and he averted his eyes, shuffling his feet.

“American food,” he murmured with the most forced chuckle he could manage but she didn’t push it and he was quietly relieved to not have to elaborate beyond the lie. He hadn’t really been eating much, lately. He didn’t want to have to tell her that.

His arrival home was met with equal excitement and as many hugs and happy tears. His mother already had katsudon made for him and he picked at it, blaming jetlag for his lack of hunger while his father sat and waxed rhapsodic about his medals, his victories, how proud they all were of him, how excited they were he’d returned home.

“You are the pride of all Japan,” his father told him, smiling, and Yuuri’s heart broke a little to know it wouldn’t last. It might have already been over, but he didn’t tell them that.

He’d lied to them during every step of his recovery. “I’ll definitely be able to skate again,” he’d said, biting back tears. “It’s already healing well, I’m ahead of schedule in rehab.”

He hadn’t been, and he’d come home with a long list of instructions for further exercises, to try and strengthen his ankle. He still hadn’t been cleared to skate, but he hardly planned to go back to the doctor for approval. He knew his own limits.

Yuuko was one of the last of his friends he saw, after his return. It took him a solid few days to work up the courage to head to the rink, but she was there when he arrived a bit after dark, locking the door with a concentrated look on her face.

She jumped when she saw him, turning at once to tell him they were closed, but her face lit up at the sight of him and she threw herself at him, arms flying around his neck.

“Yuuri!” she exclaimed, the keys in her hand rattling against his back. “You’re mom said you were coming home, but I hadn’t realized you were back already!”

Yuuri pulled away awkwardly, shuffling, hoisting his bag higher up his shoulder. “Yeah,” he told her. “I flew in a few days ago. Sorry I haven’t been by, I uhh—” He trailed off, unsure how to explain himself but her eyes softened and she smiled.

“Your injury,” she guessed and he nodded, avoiding eye contact.

“Ankle fracture, yeah. Relatively minor,” the lie was easy enough. It had been anything but a minor, routine injury. “I’m alright to skate a bit, if I take it easy. I know you’re cloing up now, though, so I can come back later—”

“Nonsense,” she said, turning back to the door and hurriedly unlocking it. “You know you’re always welcome to skate here, anytime. This is your home rink, after all.”

She accompanied him in, grinning and catching him up on the children, on daily life. Hasetsu had been booming lately, she told him, all because of his growing fame. His skating career was revitalizing the town.

She stood by, leaning against the wall and still chatting as he laced up his skates. It was a motion less familiar than it had been, and he did it with some bit of fumbling, tightening the laces more and more until his ankle, throbbing painfully, was snug enough inside he felt comfortable risking skating on it.

It had been four months since his injury and as he finally skated out into the center of the rink, not quite steady but not quite wobbly either, it was like taking his first real breath since the fall. A calm came over him and he skated a few, lazy circles to warm up, relishing the feel of the ice beneath his skates.

At the edge of the rink, Yuuko turned to leave and he called out to her, “You can stay if you like,” and she practically beamed. She had always loved watching him skate, from the time they were children and still struggling to stay standing on the slippery ice.

He skated another few, slow circles, to start, finding the music in his mind. Sous le Ciel de Paris, the music he’d used for his short program during the last Grand Prix finals. Melancholy and delicate, like most of the music he skated to.

He started slow, testing the strength of his ankle as he increased his speed, feeling relatively confident in it’s ability to withstand what he was envisioning in his mind. It ached, deep down to the freshly healed bone, but that was a different matter. It wouldn’t crumple beneath him.

He remembered his program from the finals, how intense it had been, how high he had jumped, the number of quads he’d pulled off in the second half. It had been one of his favorites of his career so far, and the crowd had thought so too.

Now, though, he was incapable of that, and so as he moved, he dropped the more complex parts of the program, losing the step combination that had been at the beginning, a series of taps across the ice that he knew his ankle could no longer withstand.

He made the first jump, though, unable to resist. It was a minor one, beautiful, though, in its simplicity. A waltz jump, with no rotations but a simple spin from one direction to the other. His ankle protested in pain as he landed it and launched into the first spin, but he didn’t so much as wobble as he moved.

His leg barely stretched as he raised it behind him, escalating the spin, and his muscles burned at the pull and he cursed himself for not maintaining his flexibility. He had lost all the grace from the real performance, a shadow of what he once was. His movements were stiff and rough.

And he struggled with a simple, sweeping glide that sent him to the outer edges of the rink, his ankle too sore, his coordination now too poor to easily control his direction. He narrowly missed the rinks edge by what felt like a hair’s breath and continued on, the speed of his momentum enough to dare another small jump, which he barely landed this time.

His heart beat fast in his chest, his body trilling with the excitement and adrenaline of being on the ice again and by the end of the watered down performance he barely felt the throb in his ankle, barely noticed the ache in the unused muscles of his legs and arms.

But he was tired, all the same, as he finally spun to a stop, hands and arms trembling as he brought them forward in front of him. He was anything but a picture of grace, but it felt so good to be back on the ice again that he hardly cared.

Yuuko, when he finally turned to look at her, had her jaw hanging open, eyes wide, hands clasped in front of her in delight. “Yuuri,” she said, “Yuuri that was breathtaking, that was phenomenal, that was—”

“Amazing, so amazing—” several voices chimed in and her daughters poked their heads up over the dasher board, clinging to it with awkward, chubby limbs. “You’re the best Yuuri!!!” They squealed in near unison and Yuuri flushed, laughing and scratching at the back of his head.

One of the girls held a phone and she fumbled with it, eyes on it while the other two only had eyes for him and his performance.

It had been a mediocre comparison to the real program, watered down and softer, stripped of all of it’s best technical aspects that had landed him the gold, and he felt almost embarrassed to have them all gushing over it like it was his greatest feat.

But the girls were soon enough distracted by their phone, passing it back and forth between them, giggling and shooting him excited looks. He skated over, eyeing them warily, certain they were up to mischief, but neither Yuuri nor Takeshi, who arrived a few minutes later, seemed concerned.

Yuuko bubbled over at him in happiness, pulling him once more into a hug and Takeshi slapped him on the back as he exited the rink, slipping on his guards.

“Are you going to skate in the Grand Prix this year?” Yuuko asked as he slowly unlaced his skates. He blinked up at her in surprise, pulling off his skate.

“Of course,” he said. Of course he was going to skate it. He was a candidate for the World Championships again next year if he scored high enough in his technicals this year. He couldn’t let his injury get in the way.

A thought seemed to cross her face but she turned it away, nodding. “You’ll do great,” she said. “And of course you’re welcome to skate here anytime. This is your home rink,, now.” She reached out and caught his arm as he stood. “You’re the pride of Hasetsu, after all.”

—

He found out the next morning what mischief the triplets had been up to when he rolled over groggily to discover his phone had blown up with notifications over night. He swiped it open, still too tired to really process it, only to discover he had been tagged on instagram in a video, the video that had elicited the notification storm.

It was a minute long video from his weak performance the night before, uploaded to Instagram from an account that, as far as he could tell, was managed by the triplets.

‘Katsuki Yuuri recreates stunning Grand Prix 2015 performance at home rink in Hasetsu, returning to ice for first time since injury earlier this year!’ It read in broken English beneath its Japanese, and Yuuri would’ve been amazed at their careful use of grammar and spelling at such a young age had he not been so horrified.

He only watched a few short moments of the video, starting where he had dropped from his first spin, before he tossed his phone aside, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes to try and fight the coming tears.

He was sloppy, barely even a distant echo of what he had once been, and now the whole world would witness it. The video had already been shared too many times to control and he drew a sharp breath, and then another, until he was on the verge of hyperventilating, shaking and curled into himself, hands buried in his hair.

He had kept his injury carefully under wraps, had hidden it as best he could. He’d barely left his dorm in the months following, so not being seen on crutches was certainly the easiest part. But not being seen on the rink had been harder.

Celestino had covered for him regarding any inquiries, had lied for him only when Yuuri had pushed him to. And Yuuri knew that other skaters suspected, Phichit himself knew but had remained complicit in his determination not to let it get out.

And of course the media had speculated, but that was really as far as it had gone and the suspicions died down after a few months.

And there it was, now, plastered across instagram for the world to see how weak he had become. He was a failure and now everyone else knew it too.

Beside him his phone set to vibrating rapidly, a phone call coming in. He snatched it up but could barely read the name through his tears. He blinked them back, rubbing at his face. It was Yuuko.

Her voice was something close to exasperated and angry in his ear, frantic in its speed. “Yuuri, Yuuri— I’m so so sorry, I had—” Her voice cut away, becoming quieter and he could hear her shouting “Stop giggling girls, or I’ll take the phone away!” and then she was back, breathless. “I had no idea they’d recorded you, I didn’t even realize until—” she sighed, leaving no room or pause for him to speak. “I’ll make them delete it—”

He cut in quick, trying to steady his voice as he finally spoke. His voice shook anyway and he prayed she couldn’t tell he’d been crying. “No, it’s— It’s fine. It’s alright, really.”

And it wasn’t, but it was too late now.

—

His world took an even sharper turn a few days later.

He’d gone to skate again, to start training again, properly, and he was skating wide, sweeping strokes across the ice, testing the flexibility in his ankle. He’d struggled to control his movements during his last time on the ice and he was determined to try and work that out, to improve what little movement his ankle gave him now.

It hurt worse than ever, after his skate the few days prior, his leg muscles protesting, even his arms almost like jello, but he powered through. He’d have to reacquaint himself to the movements, to retrain his muscles from the beginning, and he was frustrated at the thought of having to learn to skate again from the beginning, like a child.

He’d pushed the video from before out of his mind and Yuuko had ensured he would remain uninterrupted. Already, the headlines had been appearing ‘Yuuri Katsuki, injured?’ and ‘Will Yuuri Katsuki be skating the Grand Prix this year, after a debilitating injury?’

Eventually he’d shut off his phone, refusing to use it, unable to take the torment of headline after headline questioning his career, email after email begging for an interview, for some information.

He was already questioning his own future, he didn’t need to see the figure skating world speculating on it too.

But he would skate this year’s Grand Prix, even if it killed him.

Sighing, he spun, testing his ankle’s movement as he did so, trying to remember which ways he struggled to move the most so he could correct it, and then he moved faster again, picking up enough speed for a jump. It was for the sake of testing where he needed to improve than for the sake of the jump itself, but he couldn’t deny the breathtaking feeling of his body leaving the ice, if only for a moment.

His landing, wobbly but correct, was interrupted by a small burst of applause and Yuuri spun so fast he nearly crashed to the ice.

At the edge of the rink stood Victor Nikiforov, now leaning against the dasher board as if he had not a care in the world, a small smile gracing his features.

What was he doing here? What was he—

“Well done,” he said with enthusiasm and Yuuri couldn’t tell if he meant it or not. “But have you been cleared for jumps yet?”

Yuuri hesitated where he stood, frozen in place, heart pounding too fast, not from the adrenaline of his skating but to see Victor there, having seen his struggles. And before he could stop himself he was gasping down each breath as if it were his last, hands balled into fists, head hung to try and hide the panic he was feeling.

“Yuuri!” Victor called again in his thick Russian accent and it seemed to break the spell enough that Yuuri was able to compose himself enough to skate over to him.

“What are—” Yuuri took a deep breath and frowned, hands gripping the barrier where he had come to stand just beside Victor. He forced himself to make eye contact, hoping beyond hope that Victor couldn’t see the anxiety written across his face. “What are you doing here? In-In Japan?”

The sight of him here, at his own home rink, was unthinkable. This was the rink he’d gathered at with the other young skaters to watch Victor Skate, when he’d been in Juniors so many years earlier. And now the man stood here, in person, a peculiar look across his face, same charismatic smile gracing his features that had been there at the Grand Prix Banquet.

“You still plan to skate the Grand Prix this year, yes, Yuuri?” he asked and Yuuri tightened his grip, swallowing down the lump forming in his throat.

“H-hai—” he paused, hesitant. English felt almost awkward, now, on his tongue after a full week without it, and he nodded. “Yes,” he corrected quietly. “That’s the plan right now.”

Victor’s entire face lit up and it made Yuuri feel warm, despite the chill of the evening, of the ice beneath him. “Then you’ll need help,” Victor said. “Yuuri, I want to be your coach for this season, if you’ll allow it.”

Chapter Text

Yuuri didn’t immediately answer him, couldn’t find the words in himself, but Victor seemed to understand the message in his silence. I don’t know, I don’t know. The man followed after him as he exited the ice, handing him his skate guards before he could stoop to pick them up himself where he’d haphazardly tossed them aside when he’d first arrived.

“Thanks,” he mumbled as he dropped onto the bench and Victor nodded, standing nearby with his hands in his pockets, back against the wall, long jacket falling open around him. He looked picturesque and Yuuri refused to look at him as he removed the skates, fumbling more than ever from the nervousness of Victor’s gaze on him, which he could feel in his periphery.

I already have a coach, he wanted to say, but it wasn’t quite true. Did he even have a coach anymore? He’d left Detroit and Celestino behind them, and even his former coach had seemed to understand that it was likely the end for them, with the distance now between them, the anger and the depression hanging over Yuuri like a cloud he couldn’t quite push away. Victor had warned him, Celestino had warned him, even Phichit had expressed concern in a way that wasn’t quite a warning, but the message had been clear.

He was going to skate himself into the ground, and he had.

Victor had had his own career ending injury, and now the man stood here, freely offering his assistance when Yuuri hardly deserved the time of day from him. He was a nobody in the eyes of someone like Victor, he was certain, and under his gaze he felt almost judged.

The man strode over as he removed his first skate, dropping down to an almost kneel before him, moving stiffly. “May I?” he asked, reaching for Yuuri and Yuuri nodded. Victor caught his ankle in his hand, pulling his sock down enough to look it over. It was swollen, in a way that was normal for routine skating, but Yuuri had hardly touched the ice in the last week. “Does it hurt, still?”

Yuuri nodded, but didn’t elaborate. It did hurt, always, a steady, faint throb made worse by too much movement. The ice only made it all the more painful. The doctor had told him it could hurt for a long while, that lingering pain was normal. But he wasn’t supposed to be skating. “Clean break to the fibula,” he echoed, and then, curious, “How’d you know it was my ankle?” he asked quietly as Victor ran a hand softly across the swollen joint in a way that was almost intimate. It made Yuuri shudder and he told himself it was only from the chill of the evening wind blowing in from the ocean.

“You move stiffly on the ice,” Victor said after a moment, releasing his foot with one last swipe of his finger across his ankle. “There’s grace everywhere but at your feet, in your change of directions while moving. You favor your left side when you turn. I’m certain you do it as well when you walk now.” He stood and Yuuri returned to removing the other skate, hurriedly hanging his face low to hide the blush from the lingering touch. “And I’d know if it was a knee injury,” Victor continued quietly and Yuuri felt suddenly anxious at having trapped him into mentioning his own fall.

He wondered if Victor saw it as a great shame upon him, as Yuuri saw his own injury, if he lay awake at night, angry and in tears at the frustration of having messed up so badly, at having ruined what would have been the best years of his career. And Yuuri had forced him to acknowledge that, just as the triplets had forced him to acknowledge the damage of his own fall when they’d posted it for all the world to see.

He slipped on his shoes, looking up at Victor who still stood before him, studying him with soft blue eyes. “Can you really get me to the Grand Prix?” Yuuri asked.

“Your best season is yet to come,” Victor echoed. “You have to make that happen, but I can be there every step of the way, to make certain it will happen.” He extended his hand to Yuuri, who considered it for a moment, remembering the feel of it across his pain ridden ankle, how gentle and understanding Victor had been. “What do you say?”

Yuuri reached up, hesitant, and finally took it. “Alright,” he said. “Let’s do this.”

Victor was going to be his coach.

—

Dinner was Katsudon, at his mother’s insistence after Victor had asked Yuuri what his favorite food was. And Katsudon was accompanied by too many prying questions from Victor, who seemed far brighter and more excitable than he had been during their private moment at the rink. Yuuri deflected them all and watched him, instead, talking animatedly with his mother, whose English was weak but who seemed more than delighted to practice in conversation with his new coach, and he tried to reconcile him with the bright eyed flirt he’d met at the banquet the year prior, with the soft eyed, pensive man he’d just encountered at the rink.

He sat cross legged next to Yuuri, close enough that their knees brushed, and his dog, Makkachin, who he’d brought with him from Russia, lay with his head on his leg, patient against the constant onslaught of Victor’s movements. Victor was going to be staying with them, had been set up in the spare room down the hall from Yuuri’s own, and he felt overwhelmed with all of it.

Victor was going to be his coach. Victor was going to be living with him. Victor was discussing the weather with his mother.

He felt faint as he picked at his own bowl of food, and Victor took notice quickly enough. “Eat,” he insisted, and beneath the playfulness of his order was a tone that reminded him of the Victor who had whispered a quiet take it easy to him at the banquet. Yuuri flushed at the memory, embarrassed.

But he did eat more, put more food into his mouth than he pushed around the bowl and he could feel Victor watching him and he only shied away a little from the gaze.

His mother, sensing perhaps that her moment with Victor was over, bid herself goodbye and left them in privacy. And then, when she was gone, Victor launched into coach mode, aware of Yuuri’s skittishness with anything more personal.

And Yuuri was jumpy around him, definitely, hesitant at the questions. I want to know everything about you, Victor had cooed when they’d first arrived back. But Yuuri didn’t want him to know everything, least of all the worst parts— his panic attacks, the nights he couldn’t sleep, the sitting in his room for hours on end, just doing nothing. There was no joy in things anymore, even in the bowl of Katsudon in his hands, but he didn’t know how to tell Victor that.

And so he nibbled at it, enough so that it seemed to satisfy Victor. “You need to gain at least ten pounds, I think,” he said and Yuuri avoided his gaze, eyes on the generous helping of rice left in his bowl. “But we can work on that.” He said it as if it were something so easy to work on, when Yuuri was only peckish at best, rarely ever truly hungry. “First, we need to work on your ankle.”

Yuuri nodded and found it a good enough time to cast his food aside, Victor distracted enough or too tired to say anything more. “I have a, uhh—” He frowned and thought of his frustrating sessions with his physical therapist before he’d left. “I have exercises I’m supposed to do, I’ve been walked through them all, already.”

“Wonderful,” Victor said, smiling. “We’ll be up early tomorrow. I want to see you skate one more time, so I can pinpoint what we need to work on, and we’ll go from there, yes?”

-

Yuuri slept only fitfully that night, tossing and turning, kept awake by the anxiety of Victor’s arrival. By the time the man woke him in the morning, knocking persistently, yet lightly, upon his door, Yuuri was groggy and tired, the faint nausea that accompanied lack of sleep settled deep in the pit of his stomach.

Victor was bright eyed and wide awake, dressed and ready to go before Yuuri had even finished fumbling his glasses onto his face.

“Did you not sleep well?” Victor asked him at the sight of his tired face when he finally emerged from his room. Yuuri regarded him warily but only issued a tired grunt of assent. But Victor’s eyes seemed to pry, even though he didn’t vocalize it, so Yuuri continued, running a hand through his messy hair in a weak attempt to fix the bedhead he’d only made worse in his attempts to comb out.

“I’ll manage,” he told Victor.

They made it to the rink before opening, Yuuri fumbling with the key he’d been given. He’d shot Yuuko a text, to let her know he’d be there, and she’d shot him a single thumbs up emoji back. He hadn’t seen her since she’d pressed the key into his hand, a day or so after the triplets had recorded him, telling him to come by anytime at all.

He made sure to lock it behind them, this time. He didn’t need another surprise like Victor showing up.

Victor stood as he had the day before, watching him as he slipped his skates on. His ankle was stiff but he powered through, thankfully for how soft the worn in leather was on his favorite pair of skates.

“How did it happen?” Victor asked after a moment, watching Yuuri lace his feet in.

“Hmm?” he blinked up at him blearily, caught off guard.

“Your ankle?”

Oh. “I fell during practice,” he murmured, standing. He wobbled for a moment and Victor reached out and caught his arm, steadying him. His grip was gentle and warm and Yuuri flushed.

“Yes, I realize,” Victor told him, releasing him and allowing him to walk the distance to the rink himself. Yuuri managed it on steadier feet, slipping his guards off and pressing them into Victor’s waiting hands. “But how, what were you doing?”

Yuuri didn’t want to tell him and he bit his lip, slipping out onto the ice. But he stayed where he was, turning so he could face Victor, because if the man was to be his coach now, then he had to know the truth. “I was practicing a quad,” he whispered and Victor’s eyes went wide, hands tight around the skate guards.

“Why were you practicing quads, so soon after the finals?” He sounded angry and he had every right to be. Yuuri had no need to practice such difficult maneuvers, not so soon after the last event. His body had barely recovered from the prior season, but he had jumped it anyway, because he could.

He shrugged and turned sharp, despite the protest from his ankle, and headed out onto the middle of the rink. He would hear about it later, he was sure, but for now he wanted to skate, to let the freedom of the movement wash over him. He didn’t want to talk to Victor about his injury.

“Figure eights,” Victor called out to him, leaning over the dasher board. “Slow, make it tighter as you go. I want to see how you move.”

Yuuri nodded and began, sweeping wide at first, sweeping more narrow as he went. And as he went, he struggled more with the direction, the sharper curves more difficult to guide. He didn’t care about Victor’s eyes on him anymore though, just fell into the rhythm of the movement. He had always loved making large, sweeping gestures across the rink, carving his every emotion into the ice and this time was no different, even with his handicap.

He moved with stiff grace, hands behind him as he went, and he longed for a spin, or a step sequence, or a jump, but Victor, perhaps sensing his desire, called out “No jumps, Yuuri!” and so he didn’t, frustrating as it was.

When he finally drew to a slow stop, sliding up to the dasher board, he was tired, a bone deep weariness in his legs, his ankles, his feet. He’d barely been skating any time at all, it felt like, but Victor had a pensive look on his face, guards held out for him to take as he stepped from the rink.

“We’ll start with your flexibility,” he said, as Yuuri unlaced his skates, his eyes noticeably elsewhere for once. Victor seemed suddenly lost in thought, remarkably, blissfully quiet and Yuuri enjoyed the brief silence as he packed away his skates and donned his shoes, standing.

His exercises, when they eventually got to them, were routine and Victor watched, corrected a movement here, “Try it this way, it will improve your turns to the left,” and changed things up there, “Begin with this one starting tomorrow, it will be a good precursor to the rest.” And then he was settled into a regimen, stretches for his ankle with a band, a wobble board, which he hated the most, and assistance from Victor, who turned his ankle gently, back and forth, stretching the weakened tendons until Yuuri told him to stop, fingers a white knuckled grip against the bench from his pain.

It was his rehab all over again, but Victor was more stern than his therapist had been, quieter and assisting him with no pretense, no awkward small talk, and Yuuri found he liked it more, even when Victor only stood back and observed with sharp eyes.

And then after the ankle exercises came more standard skating ones. “Jog a mile, if you think your ankle can handle the impact,” Victor instructed and Yuuri nodded, certain his ankle could take that much. And abs, and leg strengthening. And that he had missed, the standard routine of preparing his body for the next season.

The next few days went as such, the two of them falling into a routine. In the mornings, Victor woke him early and helped him through the rehab exercises, timed him as he jogged, sometimes joined him, where he could. And every morning, Victor made no mention of stepping foot onto the ice, until Yuuri was bursting at the seams to ask him about it. When will you allow me onto the rink?

At night, Victor was different: coach mode in the mornings, but friendly and warm in the evenings. He was charming with Yuuri’s family, always bright and agreeable to whatever new meal his mother wanted to make for him, because Victor was eager to try anything and everything. And then after he would sit and carry on a mostly one sided conversation with Yuuri, talking about Russia, how much he loved Japan so far, asking questions as usual, ranging from more personal ones to how to say certain phrases in Japanese. He was eager for a conversation that Yuuri still felt too awkward to engage in.

Three evenings later found him once more fielding questions from Victor, sitting as they had the first night, knees brushing, only his legs burned now, rubbery and weak, and he would have shook where he stood, had he been standing.

His parents had turned in early, and so it was only the two of them in the dim lighting of the room.

“Have you ever had a girlfriend, Yuuri?” Victor asked and Yuuri almost choked on his rice. Victor paid it no mind, one hand buried in Makkachin’s fur.

Yuuri blushed from his chest to the tips of his ears, burying his face low. Maybe if he pretended as if he hadn’t heard him, Victor wouldn’t push the subject, but after a long, lingering silence the man’s eyes were still on him, and so he mumbled out a quick “No,” hoping to shelve the topic.

“I make you uncomfortable,” Victor noted and Yuuri stared a hole through the bowl in his hands, wishing for the Victor from before to return, the Victor who had been determined to have a conversation with him, who had fussed at him that morning during his exercises because he’d jogged until he’d about collapsed. “Is it my questions or my presence?” Victor went on to ask, and Yuuri would have answered anything personal now, to not answer this question, to pretend it had never been asked of him.

“Bit of both,” Yuuri mumbled before he could think better of it, speaking out of sheer panic, his heart pounding too fast, and because he had asked, Victor had asked, and he felt horrible all at once for saying anything.

Beside him Victor fell silent and it was somehow all the more uncomfortable. “I’m sorry,” the man murmured, accent thick as always, turning back to his own food, and Yuuri wished he could sink down into the floor and disappear.

And they sat like that in silence for what felt like hours before Victor finally stood, politely excusing himself. “I’ll see you in the morning,” he said and left, leaving Yuuri to sit there with his half empty bowl of food, his heart pounding, chest tight. He thought for a moment he would be sick and, with Victor gone, he raised a hand to his mouth, swallowing down a sob as anxiety took him. He shook, heaving in a breath, and then another, and then another—

A movement from the doorway drew his attention and he jerked his head up, horrified that Victor might have seen him in such a way, sitting on the floor, tears in his eyes, breath ragged and hard. But it was only Mari, who stepped in quietly and padded over, dropping to the floor next to him.

“I messed up,” he told her as she dropped an arm around him. She didn’t speak right away, just let him turn and bury his face against her shoulder. She’d always been supportive of him, had sat with him before competitions, when she was able to make it, and she understood in a way perhaps a lot of other people didn’t. She let him be and yet was there for him simultaneously.

She knew about his attacks, the crippling moments spent before his programs, the moments in between, and perhaps not quite the full truth about how bad he’d gotten over the last few month, but she knew enough, still. And she sat with him, quiet and patient as he trembled against her.

“You didn’t mess up,” she whispered, one hand stroking through his hair. “You didn’t mess up, you’re fine, Yuuri.”

But he had. He had messed up.

Chapter Text

For a week Victor was barely there, waking Yuuri in the morning as usual for their typical routine, but hidden away in his room in the afternoons. He no longer joined them for dinner, instead taking his meal in his room, always thanking his mother profusely for accommodating him and with only the smallest glances Yuuri’s way as he left, and it was clear in those brief moments how bad Yuuri had messed up, that he had driven Victor, who had been so sociable and eager to be around, to eat alone in his room with his dog.

Yuuri sat every night and picked at his food, wondering if Victor was in his room worrying if he was eating enough, as he had before, and Yuuri didn’t eat enough, because what little hunger he’d been getting from working out, from his morning jogs, was swallowed up by the constant well of anxiety sitting hard in the pit of his stomach.

The mornings were no less awkward as Yuuri went through his regimen under Victor’s guidance, the feeling hanging over them like a cloud, heavy and angry and uncertain. Would it rain or would the sun finally return?

Would the weirdness ever pass, or would they reach a breaking point, instead? Yuri couldn’t say and so he went along with it, suddenly missing the Victor from before, who had been so eager to engage him. Would Victor even stay his coach much longer, with so much tension now between them?

But Victor didn’t leave, and one week soon turned into almost two, and Yuuri got better by the day: jogged further and faster, his ankle’s endurance better, his body pushing limits he’d been near before his fall. Victor remained mum about returning to the ice, but suggested Yuuri begin incorporating stairs into his run. Every other day he finishing his jog by running the long and winding stairway up to Hasetsu Castle, and Victor was alway waiting for him at the bottom.

Some mornings he thought he would be sick from the exertion but he never let it show, hiding the tremor in his hands in the grip he had on his knees as he paused at the bottom to breath, sweat dripping from his brow, chest shuddering with every breath. And if Victor found it out of the ordinary he didn’t say.

And everyday Yuuri’s ankle was better, stronger, hurt less from more exertion, and he was excited to touch the ice again, to see how much he had improved, but day after day crept by with no word from Victor on when he’d be allowed to skate again.

And night after night, his anxiety at Victor’s absence in the evening increased, and every night was spent sleeping more and more fitfully, until eventually he finally resigned himself to fatigue and exhaustion and gave up even trying.

Some of those nights he sat up, listening to music until sheer exhaustion put him out, and then other nights he slipped quietly from his room long after everyone was asleep and headed down to the beach, where he often went when he was younger, when his nerves were most on edge, a habit he’d had to leave behind during his time in the states. But it was comfortable and familiar, the sound of the waves lapping gently onto the shore soothing, the light of the distant stars bathing him in soft reassurance. And he lingered there for hours, until his anxiety passed, when he finally crept back into the house and back to his room, to maybe finally sleep or maybe spend the rest of the night tossing fitfully.

One night, as he stepped from his room, he was startled to see Victor’s door ajar, a soft glow emanating from it. And Yuuri paused just outside of it as he walked by, his curiosity getting the best of him. Victor had been so distant, and now his door stood open as if in invitation, the sound of skating drifting from inside, the all too familiar click of skates against ice after a jump, and behind it a trickle of music that was too familiar—

It was Sous le Ciel de Paris, the music from his Grand Prix Final.

“You can come in if you’d like, Yuuri,” Victor’s unmistakable voice called from inside and Yuuri froze where he stood, heart pounding in his chest at having been caught. He swallowed it down, willing his heartbeat steadier, and slid the door open.

Victor was sitting up in bed, pillows piled behind him, sheets spread out across his lap beneath his laptop. He was wearing a threadbare t shirt, his hair rumpled, the sickly glow of the laptop screen in the otherwise dark room casting dark shadows across his face that made him look older and more tired than he was. It was a sharp contrast to his normally well manicured self.

The man smiled, though it didn’t reach his eyes and patted the bed beside him in lieu of an actual invitation. Yuuri hesitated only a moment before padding over and dropping down onto the bed next to Victor. “That’s my program from last year,” Yuuri murmured, eyes flicking to the screen. Victor had paused it in the middle of one of his quads, his body in the air, a blur of movement, let partially cocked to prepare for his landing. “Why are you watching this?”

“I’m your coach,” Victor said simply, and his accent, heavier than usual, betrayed how tired he was. He pressed the spacebar and the Yuuri in the video, clad in obnoxiously bright blue, landed with grace, swinging around and into another jump. Yuuri averted his gaze, uncomfortable at seeing himself in the video when he barely even remembered performing the routine. “I’m studying your past routines, to learn your strengths, your weaknesses—”

Yuuri shook his head. “I have no strengths, anymore,” he told Victor, looking anywhere but at the video, though he could still hear the music filtering like static through the speakers, almost lost against the sharp sound of skates sweeping across ice, the occasional clickclickclack of a step sequence. Yuuri never watched his own performances, couldn’t stomach every critique he knew he would have of himself. Even now he knew what jumps he did when, based on the sound alone, the queues of the music, and he chastised himself at how sloppy his landing sounded here, at how this jump didn’t line up quite right with the crescendo of the music.

And Victor seemed to sense his discomfort and paused the video, minimizing the Yuuri on screen who had been frozen mid spin, near the climax of the program, if Yuuri recalled correctly.

“You have plenty of strengths,” Victor insisted. “You just aren’t able to see them.” And Victor looked over at him. Up close, Yuuri could see he was as tired as the light of the screen made him seem, bags under his eyes, lines of weariness across his face, none of them so visible during the day as they were now, on this Victor whose defenses were so far gone, laid bare for Yuuri to finally understand. And he looked so exhausted as he met Yuuri’s eyes and it was as if looking at a reflection of himself, and Yuuri felt suddenly calm, felt the tight ball of anxiety that had been building itself unwind slowly and dissipate.

“This performance in particular,” he continued, giving a small nod to the screen. “I was there, Yuuri, sitting in the audience, and it was phenomenal. You’re one of the greatest skaters I’ve ever seen touch the ice. And I’m going to get you there again, I promise.”

Yuuri flushed, his breath catching in his throat in a way so much different than usual, not in anxiety but in some kind of relief. It was such an uncertain thing to promise, such a powerful gesture and Victor sounded so sure of it that Yuuri himself found it a certainty as well.

He could get there again, eventually. He would.

“I have plans, for your skate routine, if you’re amenable to hearing them,” Victor whispered in the ensuing silence, and Yuuri nodded as Victor pulled his forgotten laptop further towards them, clicking open a window of music. “I have a playlist, of potential music, and some ideas of choreography to each of them.”

And Yuuri perused the list, some of the songs familiar, some of them not. But he could see a common theme throughout all of them, upbeat and joyful. “This is different, than what I usually use,” he told Victor, as if Victor likely didn’t know, though he had to, if he’d been viewing Yuuri’s past routines.

“I know,” Victor said. “This is your comeback, Yuuri. I think we should change it up, surprise them.” And Yuuri wasn’t certain about that, letting go of what was familiar. “You always skate to such somber music, and your programs reflect that, like a great sadness within you dictates how you move, how you carve across the rink.”

Yuuri’s stomach was uneasy, because Victor wasn’t wrong. He skated for calm, for comfort, but he skated, too, to speak what was wrong with him, in some form. And the music was the embodiment of that, the movements a culmination of all of it.

“I want to see something different from you, if you’re amenable, Yuuri,” Victor murmured softly. “You skate like a women, with grace I rarely ever see in the other male skaters. I want to play that up, because it’s one of your strongest attributes on the ice. It’s what sets you apart from all others.”

Yuuri shifted awkwardly, incidentally settling closer to Victor, though it hadn’t been his intention. “That was intentional. My first coach was a ballerina, she taught me that,” Yuuri explained. “I wanted to skate in a way no others did. I wanted to embody grace.” Because he loved the movements, the small nuances in the skating that allowed him to express the emotions he wanted to.

Skating had been a form of therapy for him for as long as he could remember.

“Minako, yes?” Victor said. “I met her, earlier this week. She told me about your time with her. She said you were a diligent student.”

Yuuri flushed, anxious that Victor had spoken to her, at the possibilities of what she may have said to him. And he wondered if that had flavored the soft glances directed his way during his mornings with Victor. Had she mentioned his anxiety? Because she knew as well as Mari, as well as Phichit who had given him the same soft glances when he’d first found out.

Victor smiled and reached out, as if to touch Yuuri, but his hand drew short as if struck and he let it fall back to his side. “Why do I make you uncomfortable?” he asked softly, and the good feeling that had been building up inside of Yuuri shattered all too quickly and he drew a sharp breath, looking away.

“It’s not—” He paused and bit at his lip, unsure of what to say but certain he wanted to say it correctly this time.

He thought of the few years he had skated on the same ice as Victor, the three years in which he had stood on the podium beside him, as Victor took gold again and again, on top of the world. He thought of how nervous he had been, to finally meet Victor, only the man had hardly seemed to realize anyone else existed, least of all Yuuri, the spotlight on him and him alone. And Yuuri had shared that spotlight with him, all the same, undeserving.

“You’re intimidating,” Yuuri said at last. “You’ve always been this—” He trailed off and sighed, running a hand through his messy hair. “It’s not really you. I don’t do well around people, in general.” And it was as lame as it sounded, it’s not you, it’s me, and Victor’s eyes were on him, his half hearted attempt at an explanation obvious, so Yuuri pushed onward. “You say— You say you want to know everything about me, but there’s just so much— I don’t know, I don’t—”

Victor reached out once more and caught his hand, squeezing, and Yuuri squeezed back. “I still want to know everything about you, Yuuri,” and the way he said his name made Yuuri blush, “But I’ll let you lead from now on, I’ll—” Victor hesitated, as if searching for the correct word, “Dial it back? You tell me what you want to tell me, when you want to.”

“Alright,” Yuuri murmured.

Victor beamed, and this time the smile reached his eyes, warm and comfortable. Yuuri felt he could live with this Victor, the Victor that was defenseless in front of him, that had no fake smiles, as he recalled them from the many times he’d stood on the podium, gold medal around his neck, or over enthusiasm, born from his sudden arrival and who knew what else. Too long in the spotlight, too often a social butterfly sudden around someone who strove to avoid all attention where possible.

Yuuri pulled himself away from his coach, disentangling their hands, an idea striking him. Victor followed him with his eyes as he stood, and even Makkachin raised his head, blinking blearily at the interruption. “I want to show you something,” he said, and Victor smiled, closing his laptop with a small snap, standing as well with a flourish that didn’t quite fit how tired he seemed.

The padded through the house quietly, because it was well after midnight, and Makkachin followed them, tail wagging at the prospect of an adventure. And Victor didn’t ask where they were going as Yuuri slipped into his shoes and he did the same, and they stepped out into the crisp night air, which smelled of salt and brine and freshness.

A harsh breeze blew past them and Yuuri shivered, catching Victor’s hand and pulling him behind him, suddenly bold, a clarity and peace coming over him that was only ever present when he skated. But now he felt almost manic, itchy beneath the skin, enamored that the tension between him and Victor had been dealt with.

The path to the beach was familiar and easy enough, and Yuuri led Victor after him, until at last they stood by the shore. Makkachin followed along, running ahead and into the waves, feet leaving imprints in the sand.

“You wanted me to show you Hasetsu,” Yuuri said shyly, cheeks flushed from the chill. “This is my favorite place.”

And the view was lovely, especially with Victor there, in the middle of it all, beige sand stretching down until it disappeared into the waters, the ocean for miles, gentle and rolling and dark. And the sky was brightest here, the stars bright specks all across the sky, a luminescent backdrop against the dark canvas of sky here. Victor looked up at the sky, hair blowing gently into his eyes from the soft ocean breeze, and he was beautiful and Yuuri was suddenly awestruck by all of it, by how real the moment was.

Victor was here, Victor was his coach, and Victor was going to be there through it all, for him and him alone.

“I used to come here alot, when I was young,” Yuuri told him, squeezing Victor’s hand tight, because in their arrival he hadn’t let go, had forgotten to.

“This place, it took all of my problems away, the way the ice does, the way skating does,” and he didn’t elaborate, let Victor fill in the blanks for once. Yuuri tells him what he wants to tell him, as he was ready. And he wasn’t ready yet, for all of it. But this was a step, because Victor deserved to know eventually, if he was to remain his coach.

“I think, tomorrow, you can begin skating again,” Victor said, eyes still skyward, and Yuuri followed his gaze, heart pounding.

The stars were as Victor was, he thought, bright and unapologetic and unreachable. Beautiful in a way that couldn’t be touched, and here he was, touching Victor, fingers linked together, as if he had reached up and snatched the stars down, and now held them in his hands.

He would get through with Victor’s help, and he would skate again, skate better.

Chapter Text

Yuuri woke in Victor’s bed, because at some point they had returned and Victor had pulled him along after him and Yuuri had been so tired, too tired to protest or realize, and so he opened his eyes to a faceful of silver locks and the scent of winter chill and evergreen.

Victor was the opposite of grace, spread across the bed and tangled in the sheets, tangled in Yuuri’s legs, tangled with Makkachin, who looked equally as uncomfortable and yet somehow slept on. And Yuuri blushed hard, because Victor was pressed against him, body flush with his, despite the inelegance of his sprawl, and Yuuri could feel the man’s warmth seeping into him.

He shifted awkwardly, hoping to disentangle himself without waking him, but Victor cracked his eyes open, face inches away from his own on the pillow, and Yuuri turned even redder, looking away. Had he been awake the whole time?

“Morning, Yuuri,” he murmured, voice heavy with fatigue, and Yuuri was tired too because they’d stayed up late into the night, just talking on the beach. And it was early, far too early, but here they were, both awake anyway.

Victor pulled himself away from him, disturbing Makkachin from his slumber, who looked rightfully offended as he clambered from the bed. And Victor was beautiful as he stretched, joints cracking in a way that was familiar to a skater like Yuuri. And Victor looked almost as if in pain as he stood, and Yuuri caught the way he favored his left side and walked stiffly as he moved about the room.

Yuuri stumbled from the bed as well, yawning and stretching, body sore. But Victor had told him he would skate today and he was excited, the most excited he had been to face the day in a long while.

“Finish waking up,” Victor said sleepily, stifling another yawn. “Get started, and I’ll meet you at the rink in, say, an hour or so?” And Yuuri stood, one hand at the door, surprised.

There hadn’t been a morning since his arrival, despite their brief bout of awkwardness, that Victor had not accompanied him in the mornings, and Yuuri didn’t know what to take from that, and so he nodded and left, closing the door behind him.

By the time he was ready to go, he had only a half hour, and he spent most of the time jogging, from the hot springs and up to the castle, and then back down, along the bridge. It was strange not to have Victor waiting for him, eyes watchful as he ran passed. He’d often noted that he was more even in his stride, the hindrance from his ankle less noticeable, but now his finish was oddly silent, and he detoured by the house to collect his things before heading to the ice castle.

With their late start, the rink was already open, and Yuuko was there, stars in her eyes as she watched Victor from a distance, who stood leaning against the dasher board, eyes on the few skaters out on the rink. There were some younger children to one side, uneasy on their blades but moving nicely all the same, accompanied by Takeshi, who was instructing them gently. It reminded Yuuri of him and Yuuko at that age, barely able to stand without falling, but eager to be on the ice all the same.

Yuuko brightened when she saw him, breathless as she spoke. “Yuuri, that’s Victor Nikiforov . Yuuri, it’s Victor —” She clutched her hands together in front of her. “Yuuri, he’s been skating here everyday, at my rink, can you believe it?”

Yuuri’s heart skipped a beat and he looked over to Victor, who seemed lost in his own world. The man often disappeared before dinner, and Yuuri hadn’t thought too much about where he had gone to, but he had been here, skating. Victor Nikiforov, the legend, skating on the rink he had grown up on, just because.

Yuuri smiled softly. “Yeah, he’s my new coach.” He had been avoiding Yuuko since the video had gone viral and he had intentionally failed to mention Victor in the few times they had spoken on the phone. And Yuuko was always so busy, with the children, but somehow he still felt guilty for not making time for her.

Her expression was unreadable as she looked between him and Victor, eyes wide. “Victor’s your coach ?” she echoed in disbelief.

Behind her, Victor took notice of him and waved, coming over. “Yeah,” Yuuri murmured, suddenly distracted. “It just sort of happened.” Victor looked more awake than he had that morning, moving with more grace, and he had his own bag thrown over his shoulder. And he looked happier than he had since his arrival, happy in the same way Yuuri was beginning to feel.

He greeted Yuuko as if she was an old friend, smiling, and the woman blushed, greeting him in return. “I’ll just, uhh, leave you two to it, then,” she said to Yuuri in Japanese and then she hurried off, sneaking glances their way. He wondered how many conversations she had had with the man, not realizing why he was in town.

“She didn’t know you were my new coach,” Yuuri told Victor at his confused look, dropping down onto the bench and fumbling through his bag, pulling from it his worn skates.

“Oh,” Victor murmured, sitting down next to Yuuri. And to Yuuri’s surprise, he pulled his own skates from his bag, slipping his feet into them and lacing them with ease. Yuuri had barely slipped one foot into his own, startled as he was, and Victor shot him a sidelong glance, quirking his lips.

“I can still skate, you know,” he told Yuuri and Yuuri flushed, turning his attention back to the task at hand. Of course Victor could still skate, but Victor would be skating with him and that was the true surprise.

And he had moved with such stiffness that morning, hiding his pain behind a curtain of hair, but Yuuri had noticed, because he often did much the same himself. “You looked like you were in pain this morning, is all,” Yuuri whispered, and it was almost lost in the giggles of the children nearby.

Victor froze, hands still on his laces. His hair obscured his face and rendered his expression unreadable and Yuuri wondered briefly if he had overstepped in his newfound comfort around the man. “I’ll be fine,” was all he said, and then he stood, holding out a hand for Yuuri.

Yuuri took it, enjoying the calloused warmth of his hand in his, as he had in the chill of the ocean air the night before. And then together they skated out into the rink, Yuuri’s heart racing to be skating beside his idol. And Victor’s hand was an anchor, keeping him steady on the ice though he hardly needed it. But it was again like he was young, images of Victor’s skate routines, long hair fluttering behind him, the motivation to keep steady on the ice when he was wobbly and new and inexperienced.

And here he was skating with him.

“No jumps,” Victor told him, something more than stern in his voice and Yuuri nodded.

The children, by the time they began, had blissfully exited the ice already, ushered out by Takeshi to allow them privacy, most likely. And that’s what they had, silence save for the soft sounds of blades over ice.

Yuuri felt weightless as they moved, Victor pulling away from him first, moving in a beautiful arch across the ice. He instructed Yuuri to follow after him, to mimic his movements, and he said it in the way he moved and the beckoning gesture towards him as Yuuri stood dumbfounded in the middle of the rink, unmoving.

And then he moved too, heart racing faster, but not because Victor was there, but because he was there, once again on the ice, the season ahead of him and his ankle a forgotten throb of pain in the excitement of moving again across a rink.

Victor’s movements were easy enough to follow: the man moved slow and graceful, but challenged Yuuri’s prior weakness of sharp turns and sweeping direction changes. And Yuuri fell into stride nicely enough, still not quick on the turns but capable of them, all the same, more so than he had been weeks prior.

And he didn’t think of his program from the year before, of all he had been capable of before , and focused only on the rush going through him, Victor’s soft white skates as they carved across the ice in front of him. And then the man turned, skating backwards, and Yuuri’s breath caught in his throat, because this was almost Victor as he remembered him, before his accident, beautiful .

And he was beautiful still, and Yuuri almost stumbled watching him, but corrected quickly enough. Victor chuckled and swept hard to the back and around again, coming to a stop at the rink’s edge.

“Continue,” he called out, “I want to observe a bit better.”

And so Yuuri did, continuing across the ice with a flourish, building speed until he was moving reasonably fast, turning tight movements here, moving backwards, moving through every basic intermediate move that didn’t include a jump. He minded his feet carefully, stepping gentle in his movements, and it was like living again, when he hadn’t been for so long.

He was alive.

Victor was watching him with silent eyes as he finally drew to a stop, catching his breath and tired, weak in the legs as he skated over to where the man stood on the ice. Victor reached out, as if to touch him, but drew short, as he had the night before, letting his hand fall back to his side. “There’s been a lot of improvement,” he said, smiling instead, and Yuuri smiled too.

He was exhausted as they finally left, legs rubber as he descended the stairs from the rink. Victor was uncannily quiet, even in light of their conversation the night before, and Yuuri couldn’t help but feel unnerved by it.

He paused as they reached the street, and Yuuri followed his gaze to the castle in the distance. Victor was more lost in thought than anything, but Yuuri stopped as well, teetering on the final step. “Would you like me to take you there?” he asked, and Victor blinking, looking his way.

“Ah, the castle? I admit it has piqued my interest.”

“It’s not all the exciting,’ Yuuri said with a shrug. “It’s not a real castle, more for show. There’s a ninja house inside.”

And Victor’s previous melancholy was suddenly replaced with excitement. “Ninjas?” he exclaimed, and he was abuzz as he headed in that direction, Yuuri running to catch up.

“It’s really, really not as exciting as it sounds,” Yuuri insisted once more, but Victor already had his phone out, excited all the same. So Yuuri went with it, following after him and towards the castle, where Victor thrust his phone into his hands.

“Take a picture of me,” he said and he posed and Yuuri laughed at the ridiculousness of it all, snapping several photos in a row before handing the phone back to him. It occurred to him as he did so that Victor had had the chance to get pictures with the castle every morning he had jogged the stairs, and yet he hadn’t until Yuuri had wanted to take him there. He’d waited for it to be an activity they did together.

“Great,” Victor said. “One of us together now?” Yuuri hesitated, recalling the leaked video of his performance, and the man’s face softened. “I won’t post it unless you’re alright with it,” he added, and Yuuri nodded and stepped into frame with him as he smiled, holding the phone out.

He showed it to him after, and the photo was neatly taken, Yuuri at the bottom, Victor over him, taller, and the beautiful castle in the background, offset by a crystal clear sky. Yuuri smiled.

“You can post it if you like, I suppose,” he said, because it was a good photo and he himself had never been active on social media much, so an errant photo of him hardly hurt, especially after being off the radar for so long.

Victor pressed a finger to his mouth, considering it. “If I post it, it’ll come out that I’m your coach, more than likely,” he told him, and Yuuri hadn’t thought of that but took a moment to consider it anyway. Victor was a renowned coach, and he was here in hasetsu with Yuuri, taking photos with him. The connection was obvious.

Maybe it was time. It was already out that he had injured himself, and no doubt there was speculation on his return to skating. An injury at his age just as likely meant retirement and he’d made no move thus far to confirm or deny anything, despite inquires forwarded to him by Celestino, who was typically the one to receive media requests on his behalf.

“Let me post it? I think it’s time I let everyone know,” Yuuri suggested, before he could change his mind, and within moments his phone dinged and he pulled it from his pocket to see the photo texted to him from a number that could only have been Victor’s. “You have my number?” he asked, surprised, trying to recall when he had given it to the man.

“You gave it to me at the Banquet last year,” Victor said, a look of confusion coming over him.

“Oh.” And Yuuri at once felt awkward, racking his brain. The last thing he remembered well from the banquet was downing a glass of champagne as he talked with Victor. “I don’t really remember the banquet,” he told the man, pulling up his Instagram as he spoke, again before he could reconsider.

Victor laughed. “You did have quite a bit to drink. I suppose I’m not surprised, really,” and Yuuri only flushed harder. He made no further mention of it, though, and Yuuri was suddenly scared to ask what had actually happened, especially that would lead him to giving Victor his number. Maybe later, when his anxiety could take it, because now it was nearing a small peak, from the photo, from the mention of an event he had no memory of.

He started on posting the photo though, tagging Victor, because he embarrassingly knew the man’s Instagram handle by heart, because he followed him himself, though he hardly ever checked the account. He hesitated from there, though. “I’m not sure what to say,” he said, looking the photo over, now highlighted with a filter that brightened their hair, the sky behind them, emphasized the dark lines on the castle.

“May I?” Victor asked, and Yuuri changed his keyboard over to English quickly before he surrendered his phone to him. He took only a moment before handing it back, and Yuuri read it over. The English was odd against the backdrop of Japanese across his screen.

Yes, I’ll be skating this season, accompanied by my new coach, @v-nikiforov . Simple and to t he point, which Yuuri appreciated well enough, but it felt as if something was missing. Quickly, he amended it, rewriting the text below in Japanese, and then he posted it.

Victor already had his phone out when he looked up. “Ahh,” he said, and it now read the legendary @v-nikiforov. He smiled and double tapped it, liking it, and by the time Yuuri cleared the notification there had been several more likes.

“I guess it’s out there now,” he said, turning his phone off and putting it away because he wasn’t really ready to face the fallout yet. No doubt his phone would start blowing up soon, as it had when the video had gone viral. Except this time he was aware, he had time to prepare himself emotionally, and he planned to take that time.

Victor, though, seemed delighted, as delighted as he had been when he’d first announced he wanted to be Yuuri’s coach. And now here they were. It felt like it had been just yesterday but it had been nearly a month.

“I think,” Victor said, “We should work on your media presence as well, you’ve often been quite silent on that front.”

Yuuri shrugged, because there wasn’t much to say on that. “I’ve never really been fond of talking to the media. I did in the beginning, but—” He trailed of, because as he had said, there was little to say.

Victor fell silent for a bit, perhaps turning his words over in his head, and Yuuri didn’t press him, almost dreading the moment he would speak again. And of course, he did speak again eventually. “Maybe we can cross that bridge when we get to it, yes?” he suggested and Yuuri nodded a bit too quickly, relieved. The photo was a start, and that would do for now.

When they had returned, Victor wanted to show him the playlist of music he put together, and he dragged him off to his room, where Yuuri again sat with him, awkward beside him on his bed. They shared a set of headphones, Yuuri shifting closer in proximity to him to better the comfort of it.

“We’ll decide the music for the free skate first. Be honest with how you feel with each one. I only want you to skate what you feel comfortable skating to,” Victor told him, and Yuuri felt hesitant to do so, often didn’t like speaking his mind in such a way, but it was necessary, he supposed, given the circumstances. And he was eager, because this was the beginning, the framework that would set the tone for his entire next season.

The first two songs were a no within the first minute in and Victor gave no comment as he skipped them for the next one, and by five songs in he liked none of them. Victor, still, gave no hint of impatience or frustration as Yuuri tore apart the list.

“Wait,” he said, about seven songs in, and Victor froze, mouse already hovering above the skip button. “I like this one, it’s different.” And it felt almost like the music he typically prefered to skate to. Victor had a smile on his face that spoke of something Yuuri couldn’t quite place, and he handed to him the other earbud, sliding his laptop over.

He listened through it twice, then a third time. It started slow, almost somber with a flavor of the crescendo it eventually reached, and it was almost romantic, with the same passion he preferred, though it was higher and faster and louder at it’s peak. The language he couldn’t place, but it was beautiful. “This is the one,” he said breathlessly, pulling the headphones from his ears. “This one for the free skate, definitely.”

Victor’s smile was almost sad. “It’s Stammi Vicino, Stay Close to Me ,” he told him. “I always wanted to skate to this, but I never got the chance.” And Yuuri’s heart ached to hear it, because Victor, if anyone, would have brought a life to the music that no one else could.

“I wish I could have seen it,” Yuuri whispered.

“You will get to see it,” Victor said. “ You’ll be skating it, now.” And he was right, he would be skating it, not Victor. This would be his legacy.

Chapter Text

He waited until the next morning to turn his phone back on, reasonably certain he was ready for the news having traveled, for once waking on a good night's sleep. It was still early, though, earlier than Victor and he usually headed out, and so he stayed in bed, squinting from the bright light of his phone screen in the early morning darkness of his room.

The photo had, of course, blown up over night, his phone blowing up in equal amounts as it booted up. The photo itself was filled with comments and likes, many from other skaters, and many more from fans. He had multiple texts, but the only ones he bothered to read were from Phichit. Four texts in total: Victor is your coach now!!! and one filled with nothing but excited emojis, and then please don’t push yourself too hard, though , and then, finally, an article forwarded to him from the IFS, entitled Skating Legend Katsuki Yuuri making comeback after injury with new coach, Victor Nikiforov. He clicked through and only skimmed it.

It was typical and generic. Mentions of Yuuri’s previous medals, and had there really been so many? Two golds at the Grand Prix Finals, two bronzes, a silver. Bronze at his second Worlds, a handful of others sprinkled across other events. They described him perhaps with too much flattery: legendary, Japan’s top skater, who would go down in the history books. But that was hardly true and he skipped most of the flowery language.

There was mention of the previous speculation regarding his injury, because his absence had been noticeable at the year’s Worlds event, and then the confirmation everyone had been wanting. He’d been injured, definitely, revealed in the leaked video of his recreation of last week’s routine, as they referred to it. And then they elaborated on Victor almost as much as they had on him, on his victories, on his injury, which Yuuri skipped, uncomfortable reading about it when Victor himself had volunteered so little information on it. It didn’t seem fair to gain further insight into it without it coming from him.

He closed it out and texted Phichit, can you talk? because it was only about late afternoon where he was in the states. And the call came right away, his phone vibrating steadily in his hand as he fumbled to answer it, startled.

“Yuuri!” he exclaimed. “Why didn’t you tell me Victor was your coach? This is amazing!” And Yuuri couldn’t help himself, he laughed. It seemed so unreal, but it was true enough, had been true enough for over a month. He didn’t push the subject though, his focus turning elsewhere almost immediately. “How have you been? Are you doing better?” And Yuuri knew he didn’t mean his ankle, but everything else that had followed it.

Yuuri nodded, though he couldn’t really say if that was the truth. Certainly he was no longer as bad as he had been, but hardly better. “Things are going well here,” he said. “I’m glad to be home.” And he was, even if he was still distant from everyone, but he was working on that. “How are you?”

“Good, good,” Phichit said on the end of the line, a faint tinge of static rolling through his words. “Celestino is really wearing me down, though. But I’m going to compete in the next season. I expect I’ll make it the Grand Prix Final this year.” Yuuri didn’t doubt it. His friend had been flying through mastery of his jumps by the time Yuuri had returned home. “Maybe we’ll face each other, Yuuri. You’re the one to beat this season.”

Yuuri bit back a laugh at the ridiculousness of it. “Even with my injury,” he murmured without thinking and for a brief moment he thought that maybe Phichit hadn’t hear him but the line went awkwardly quiet for a long moment.

“You’ll do great,” Phichit said.

“You’ll do great, too. I’m excited to skate with you,” he returned and Phichit laughed.

“You mean against me,” he said, and he wasn’t wrong. They’d be competing against one another, and Yuuri didn’t really want to think about it. He’d never really had to compete against a friend, had spent most of his skating career avoiding other skaters, his competition, media requests, everything that had led up to him being considered aloof and introverted, and all of the other not quite synonyms that attached themselves to that persona.

He was none of those things, but shy and quiet, and maybe introverted around those he didn’t know. He was hardly that way with Phichit, with Celestino, with his family. And he was less like it with Victor, now, as the weeks had gone by.

Phichit, eventually, had to go, and by the time he did, it was past time for Victor to have come and fetched him. He set his phone aside, the screen still full to brimming with notifications, and changed and headed out to look for him.

He didn’t answer the knock on his door, but Makkachin was wandering about the hallway, tail wagging. He stopped to pet him, to ruffle the fur around his neck, which he liked, and then he padded downstairs to find his sister at the desk there. She smiled at him, but didn’t drop her slouch against the entrance counter.

“You looking for Victor?” she asked, and at some point during dinner the night before she must have realized the awkwardness between them had passed. She’d pulled him into a rare hug before he had returned to his room. “He’s out in the hotspring. He just headed there.”

Yuuri frowned, surprised, because there had only been a morning or two that Victor had declared a rest day, and even then he usually told Yuuri ahead of time. But he headed out to the hotspring, which was quiet this time of day, and found Victor at the far one, head reclined back, eyes closed. He looked peaceful but noticed Yuuri’s presence right away, opening his eyes. And at once the peacefulness of his face was gone and he only looked tired.

“Yuuri,” he said, slipping forward, chest dipping briefly beneath the waters before he stood. “I’m sorry, I meant to wake you.” He did genuinely sound sorry, but he also sounded as tired as he looked. Where Yuuri had had his first good night’s sleep in months, Victor had clearly had a poor one, and he could sympathize. “You should join me,” he continued. “It’ll be good for your aching muscles.”

He did ache, but he felt a bit embarrassed at the idea of joining him. Still, he swallowed it down and nodded. It seemed right to join Victor, to maybe have that much as a bonding experience, because he’d pushed so hard against it at first and now Victor was patient and kind and only let him do what he was comfortable with. And he would be a bit embarrassed, sure, but not uncomfortable. He nodded as he stepped away, and he returned within minutes, showered down, towel about his waist.

Victor’s gaze lingered on him as he finally dropped down into the water, and he hid the blush creeping up his chest in the warm waters. “You’ve put on some weight,” was all he said, which almost set Yuuri to sputtering, eyes wide, but Victor was quick to clarify. “In a good way, of course. You’re regaining some muscle, especially in your legs.”

He smiled. “Does that mean you’ll allow me to do jumps soon?”

Victor shook his head, leaning his head back again. “Not yet, you’re hardly back on the ice. But soon.”

Yuuri looked away, down at the swirling waters, and Victor changed the subject. “The photo we took has gone viral,” he commented and Yuuri nodded. “I think everyone knows by now, if they didn’t already.” He closed his eyes, and up close he looked delicate, far from the stern coach he was, and he showed his age more. Twenty seven? Maybe twenty eight, by now. Yuuri couldn’t quite remember. At his own lingering silence, he cracked an eye open. “That I’m your new coach, I mean,” he clarified though Yuuri had figured out what he meant quickly enough.

Yuuri slipped down until the water was almost to his chin. It was warm, warmer still when offset against the chilly coastal breeze that came by every now and again. And his ankle throbbed not nearly as often as usual, and felt almost nice within the hot water. “I’m sure every figure skater and their mother knows, by now.”

Victor laughed, opening his eyes. “You made a joke,” he said with a grin, and it startled Yuuri because he hadn’t really realized how little he joked without his pointing it out. Had he really become so serious? “But in all seriousness, it’s made its rounds, certainly. I already have several requests from the media to speak with you.”

Yuuri blinked, surprised. “Oh,” he managed, remembering his words the day before. They’d cross that bridge when they came to it, and they had come to it. “Do you want me to—”

Victor shrugged. “It’s up to you,” he said. “Mostly there’s questions about your injury, they want details, of course. And there’s interest in what the theme of your season will be.” He stood, disturbing the water around him, and Yuuri carefully didn’t look until he had finally shrugged on one of the inn’s robes. It hung off his frame, loose and provocative.

“I hadn’t really put much thought to that, to be honest.” And he hadn’t. Had only rarely put the minimum of thought into his previous year’s themes. He’d left a lot of that to Celestino, and had focused more on his choreography, on the music, on perfecting his routine. Often, he barely gave thought to his outfits even, which had resulted in the bright blue monstrosity he had worn during his last season. “But,” he continued. “I think maybe it’s time I changed that. Talking to the media, I mean. About my injury, and everything else. I can’t continue to—”

Victor dropped down in front of him, kneeling, reaching for him, and Yuuri let him catch his hands, which had come to rest against the smooth rocks. And he held them for a long moment, smiling softly. “You can continue however you like. That’s your decision to make, not anyone else’s. Certainly not mine. Make it because you want to.”

And suddenly he hesitated, overwhelmed by Victor’s touch, somehow delicate despite how small a gesture it was. It was what he had been missing most from the man, the small touches from the beginning.

His heart raced and anxiety filled him, but it was different. He felt anxious, yes, but he felt in control, as well. “I want to do it,” he told him. “I want to because I want to,” and Victor smiled softly and it made his heart flutter differently this time.

Yuuri met him in his room, later, and Victor was sitting on the floor, still in his robe from earlier, and he gestured for him to sit as well. He dropped down cross legged, sitting opposite him. He had his laptop open and he handed it over to Yuuri, the requests sorted out for him.

“I’ve been getting emails all morning,” he told him, and there were multiple requests, many of them international. Yuuri insisted on a Japanese publication and Victor agreed it would be best, but by doing so he would likely exclude Victor from assisting him, from coaching him through it. He didn’t know what to say on the fly, and that’s what it would be. He himself had to set it up due to the language barrier, but it was under Victor’s guidance all the same.

“I’ve done this plenty of times, don’t worry,” Victor told him. “I’ll walk you through it before hand.”

Yuuri frowned. “With Yuri? Plisetsky?”

And Victor looked away, averted his gaze in a way that said more than what he wanted to say out loud. “Yes, he’s one of the best skaters in Russia. And he dislikes engaging the media just as much as you,” he explained, but he didn’t elaborate further and Yuuri had the suspicion that discussing his former time with the boy was a bit of a sore spot.

And maybe his absence during the other skater’s programs was a reason he was considered so aloof, avoided by them often. Maybe it was why he was never able to connect to them enough to manage a conversation, even.

He regretted it now, but it was hardly the time to dwell on it.

Right away the publication emailed him back, and Victor slid it over to him so he could translate. “They want to do it now,” he said in a panic. “Right now, as soon as possible.” He looked at Victor wide eyed. “What do I do? What do I say?” And suddenly he was panicking more, and Victor reached out and pressed a hand against his chest, bringing it up to squeeze his shoulder.

“We’ll go over a script, first. I’ll walk you through it,” he reassured him. Yuuri didn’t feel very reassured, but he nodded anyway.

“Okay,” he said. “Okay.”

And Victor launched into it. “They’re going to ask about your injury, definitely,” he began, dragging his hand over Yuuri’s ankle. “Don’t give too many details. Don’t tell them how , but the bare minimum: It was an ankle injury, you fell during practice. Injuries during practice aren’t that uncommon, don’t let them press you on it. Be confident in your answer and they likely won’t pursue it further.”

“Okay,” Yuuri said weakly, bringing his hand down to cover Victor’s where it was still against his ankle, lingering there for only a moment.

“They’ll want to know about your upcoming season, give them no comment. Embellish it, though. Can you do that?” he asked, and Yuuri again nodded. “Tell them it’s a surprise, play that up.” Victor seemed calm, though he spoke with a rapidity that made even Yuuri struggle to follow him, as excellent as his English was. He felt dizzy. “And they’ll ask about me, I’m certain. Tell them what you want on that front. You have my permission to speak freely about me.”

And then, when the anxiety passed from too long a moment of slow breathing, his hand tangled in Victor’s, he made the call.

The man that answered was the same man from the email, and he sounded cheerful and professional as he introduced himself, made small talk for a few moments. He knew what he was doing, had likely had his job longer than Yuuri had been skating. He was older, but precise in his conversation, steering it as he needed to, professional in a way that calmed Yuuri a bit. He would guide and he was only answering the questions he needed to.

The first was, of course, about his injury, and he responded with the script Victor had given him, hesitant but gentle as he turned down the questions pushing for more. Ankle injury, he fell during practice. No mention of the quad he had failed, of how he had been overworking his body. But that came up, to his surprise.

“You appeared exhausted during your last season. Did this in anyway contribute to your fall?” And Yuuri’s breath caught in his throat and he tightened his grip on Victor’s hand, on his own ankle.

“No comment,” he said, and Victor’s eyes were on him, watching and listening though he didn’t understand a word of what he said. But he seemed to know either way his response, from the brevity of it, from his change in posture. He sat stiff now, hand tighter on the phone. And he had realized early on that Victor was good at reading body language. It had been a contributing factor in his initial discomfort around him.

The man on the other end seemed dissatisfied with the answer, and Yuuri knew it would be in the article. No comment on something was as good as a yes. He damned himself by not lying, instead.

The next questions were as generic as the one’s Victor had run him through: Themes for his coming season, was he recovered enough from his injury to compete to his fullest (and that one was a definitive yes, even if he himself couldn’t be sure of that, no hesitation as Victor had said.) And only then did he mention Victor: his role as his coach, why the sudden change. Did Victor’s own injury contribute to his desire to coach Yuuri.

All of those he struggled more to answer. He was a great coach , and He had needed a change, in the wake of his injury, he’d returned home to Hasetsu and Victor had contacted him about coaching him (a lie, still, because Victor had just shown up out of the blue, but they didn’t need to know that because knowing that would only lead to more uncomfortable questions), and the last question he took the longest with. He himself had barely spoken to Victor about his injury, had taken great care to respect his privacy when he limped slightly or looked to be in pain, as he had clearly been in that morning. But he remembered Victor’s fall all the same, how nasty it had been. His dwindling career in the wake of it, and  it was his biggest fear. His own dwindling career.

He deflected the question. “Victor is perfectly suited to be my coach, given my injury,” he said, and again he embellished it when asked further. “He is working with me to overcome the detriment I’ve faced in the wake of my fall.”

And then the last question: was this to be his last season? And he hadn’t considered it himself, had pushed it far from his mind because at this point he wasn’t certain if he would make it through the coming season. But he wanted to, wanted to keep skating as long as he was able, which wouldn’t be long. He was twenty four, rapidly approaching the typical age for retirement.

“No,” he said with certainty. “This will not be my last season.” It couldn’t be, because what would he do then?

And then he ended it, after a bit more awkward small talk. When he hung up, at last, Victor was watching him expectantly, and he filled him in, telling him what he remembered, recalling his answers as best he could.

“They probably won’t even use half of that,” he told him reassuringly. And it was a small comfort, at least, though he knew they would at least mention his refusal to comment on the cause of his injury. He’d mentioned that to Victor, voicing his concern which he hardly ever did, and Victor gave him a smile. “Don’t dwell on it, now. What’s done is done.”

And so Yuuri tried his best to push it from his mind, and they moved onto other things, Victor standing and moving about the room, gathering up his headphones, a notebook. When he again dropped down it was next to him, instead, their knees brushing.

“I stayed up last night planning your choreography for your free skate,” he told Yuuri, flipping through the notebook, which was filled with Russian in a barely legible scrawl, even considering he didn’t know the language. “I’ll run you through it tomorrow, we’ll start with the basics. We can bring in the jumps once we’ve established what you can do.” He made no mention of when that would be, though. “The assignments should be announced next week, but we’ll have months to prepare. You’re already qualified so there’s no need to worry about that.”

He’d placed high enough at the prior Final, and he nodded.

“And,” Victor continued, pushing the notebook over to him on the page he had been looking for. “I worked on a design for your outfit, at least for the free skate. And I have an idea for the short program music, as well. I’ve found a song I think fits.” It was surprising, because he’d typically used ready made outfits, with minor alterations. But custom ones weren’t unheard of, he was certain all of Victor’s had been custom.

Yuuri looked it over, dizzy with the amount of information he was giving to him, and this was where Victor excelled as a coach, aware of everything: the dates, the choreography, the pr, the outfit. And it was well drawn enough, clearly not at an expert level, but the design was there. Something resembling a suit, with a separate jacket over all of it, complete with embellishments along the shoulders, the sleeves, a neckline that plunged down low. It was incredibly masculine and not his normal style at all, but he thought back to the music, and decided it worked well.

“I like it,” he told him. “But what about the color?” He remembered the blue from the year before and shuddered.

“Black, but the jacket should be colorful, I think,” he tapped the pencil he was holding against his mouth, a nervous gesture that was a close reflection of how he often pressed his finger to his mouth whenever he was excited. “Maybe red?” And Yuuri at once shook his head, but Victor pressed him. “Dark red, it expresses passion, emotion. It suits the song.”

“Alright,” Yuuri said, defeated, though he was silently agreeing in some part that it was an appropriate representation of the coming season, his chosen music. “And you said you had an idea for the music of the short program?”

Victor’s face lit up and he fumbled his laptop over, handing over the headphones. Yuuri listened carefully, and it was a fitting accompaniment to Stay Close to Me , with a slow build, a high crescendo. It was haunting, almost, but rose into a sort of splendor. And again, it was hardly the type of music he would have skated in previous years, but he found him excited at the prospect of using it. “I like it,” he said. “I really, really like it.”

“It’s called Conquest of Paradise,” and Victor smiled all the more. “I’m glad you like it, because I’ve already designed something for it, as well.” He flipped the page in the notebook. “I realized you might rather like to play up the androgynous aspect more, it’s more suited to how you skate.” This one was one piece, simple, startlingly simple, save for the neck line, which contained a sprinkling of what the shading could only indicate was a sparkle, running down in fine lines. The sleeves were the same, and across it all was a delicate line that likely indicated a change in color.

“And what color?” he asked, again. Victor hesitated, this time.

“Black,” he said, indicating the side with the most color. “And dark red, again. A reflection of the skater you were, into the skater you will become. A mirror of the one for the free skate, but elegant. It fits the music.” Ad Victor watched him carefully, observing his reaction. And this one Yuuri loved, but didn’t quite know how to put words to it. “Of course,” he added hurriedly. “I’m going to go through the woman who used to do all my old outfits. The final product will likely be different, I can communicate any changes you may want.”

“No, no, this is— this is wonderful,” he said. And he meant it, he loved it. It was coming together, all of it. And he had some semblance of an idea for a theme coming together, as well, but he withheld that. He had yet to see the choreography Victor had come up with.

Victor was excited, though, he could tell, and he fed off that energy, all of his prior anxieties about the coming season melting away. “Now,” Victor said, reaching a hand out and sweeping it through Yuuri’s hair. “How do you feel about growing your hair out?”

Chapter Text

The article from his brief interview made it’s arounds, just as the photo of him and Victor had. Yuuri didn’t read it himself, taking all he needed to know from the look on Victor’s face as he read it. Taking enough from it to decide he didn’t need to read it himself. But Victor assured him it was fine. “Mostly speculation about your injury,” he told him. “But there’s a lot of buzz online about your coming season!” And it was as much of an explanation as Yuuri needed. He focused on skating again, relieved to be making the final push towards progress.

He skated every day, now, and had since Victor had allowed him back onto the ice. He spent most days running him through bits and pieces of the choreography he was putting together for the free skate, often standing on the sidelines and furiously making notes, calling out, “Again,” until Yuuri thought he might collapse, because he was too stubborn to tell Victor he was tired. And most days went that way, Victor solidly and unwaveringly back in coach mode, spending every moment with Yuuri with a notebook and a pen, and the few times Yuuri got a glance at what he was writing he saw it was all in Russian, sloppy and what might have been almost chicken scratch. Yuuri didn’t know Russian well enough to make the call, but it was the same inelegant scrawl from before.

But Victor seemed to know what he was doing, joining him on the ice on occasion to walk him through certain motions he had in mind. What little Yuuri was able to piece together from the stuttering moves he performed was beautiful, and by the day his excitement grew at what the final product would look like. Victor had offered to run him through what he had in mind in more detail, but Yuuri had declined. He wanted the free skate to stay a surprise for as long as possible.

And then, within the week, the announcement came for his placement in the Grand Prix. Victor got the news first, an early riser, and he was excitedly knocking at his door as Yuuri was getting ready. By the time he finished and stepped out, Victor was practically shaking with excitement. It was like him, to work himself up into an excited frenzy, and Yuuri often struggled to understand where he found the joy and energy to do so.

“You were seeded in,” Victor breathed, which they both knew at that point. He’d scored too high in the previous season to be anything but. “You’ll be skating the Cup of China, early November. The Rostelecom Cup, late November.” And the Grand Prix Final would be mid December, in Barcelona. He didn’t reflect Victor’s excitement though, he only felt dread.

What if he didn’t recover enough for the next season? What if he bombed, in front of the world? But Victor seemed to have all the confidence in the world in him, and it was a small reassurance. Victor had faith in him, and it helped him swallow down the self doubt, at least for the time being.

He had five months until the first event.

And Victor hadn’t yet allowed him to do jumps again, had restricted him only to step sequences, a spin here and there (though those he always seemed unsatisfied with, and Yuuri had performed so many spins in the last week he felt dizzy just thinking about it.)

And then Victor was ushering him out the door with barely a moment for him to collect himself in the wake of the news, and maybe that was for the best, it left him without much time to spiral downward, and only enough time to keep up with Victor, who moved fast as always.

He moved, always, as if he was on the ice, still, and Yuuri always found it a shame that he wasn’t anymore, not really. The brief times he assisted Yuuri, showed him routines, even the times he skated alone at the rink weren’t the same. And it never would be. He wondered if others would notice the same in him, eventually.

Victor joined him on the ice, skated out onto it first, gesturing for Yuuri to stay where he was and not follow him. He did a few large loops, to acquaint himself, and Yuuri noticed that at some point he had slipped on headphones, and he realized, suddenly, why Victor had headed out onto the ice alone.

Victor dipped his head, looking downward, serene, and when he raised it up, skyward, his eyes lingered across Yuuri for the briefest moment. He performed a slow, sweeping movement around, arms crossing his body, and then another and it looked almost sad, as he stretched, dipping one knee down and onto the ice before rising and falling sideways, almost intentionally, before launching into the program fully, building speed as he went, arms outward as if reaching for a distant lover, and he locked eyes with Yuuri every moment he could. And then he moved in a way that could only have been for a jump, and Yuuri wrapped his hands tight around the rink’s edge, suddenly terrified.

It was a double, though Yuuri was certain it was supposed to be something else in the final program, but Victor landed it cleanly in a backwards sweep, and then swept gently into another jump, and then into a long, elegant spin which lasted longer than the ones he’d been running Yuuri through.

Yuuri recognized more and more of it as he moved, a sweeping motion here, a long glide around on one foot, leg extended outwards, and all of it was beautiful, brought together at last, every annoying repetitive motion Victor had been making him skate again and again falling into a bigger picture. And it pained Yuuri to know Victor would never skate it for anyone but him. And selfishly, he also felt happy at that, too, that this was for his eyes only, Victor skating again as he had in his prime, hair fluttering as he moved, arms outstretched, passionate and elegant and wistful, and it was for Yuuri only.

This was the free skate, done and in all its glory, skated as Victor had always intended it to be: by him. But Yuuri would be skating it and never would he ever do it justice.

He drew to a stop, at last, and he looked exhausted and Yuuri pretended not to notice the faint tremor in his hand as he pushed his way back over to him. A faint sheen of sweat shone across his forehead, and there was a furrow in his brow that Yuuri thought might be from more than the strain on his body, but Victor showed no hint of pain as he reached out and caught his shoulder.

He was out of breath, though, that much he couldn’t hide, and he leaned close. “Can you skate it?” he asked, voice barely more than a whisper, and it was almost sinful, how close he was to Yuuri, hands against his shoulder to help keep himself upright, face barely inches from his own. Yuuri nodded, feeling faint, and Victor smiled. “Good, then we’ll get started now.”

Yuuri protested, alarmed. “Now?” he asked, “Are you sure, you look—” He didn’t know what word best described it, but Victor’s whole body shook as he leaned over to slide his guards onto the blades of his skates. “Tired,” Yuuri settled on. “You look tired.”

“I’m fine,” Victor said, but his previous mood was clearly gone, all traces of excitement gone . He was tired, and it reminded him of himself, lying to Celestino while he headed back out onto the ice again, on the verge of collapse. He wondered if it had been so obvious to his former coach. “I want to start with the beginning, only. For now, at least. I want you to learn it in pieces, first.”

In pieces, as he had been learning it before, but from all of that he already knew most of the movements. With one last glance back at Victor, who stayed where he had previously been, arms crossed against the rail, Yuuri followed Victor’s path out onto the ice.

“No jumps,” Victor called out, before he could begin, and Yuuri nodded, though he found himself a bit annoyed. Even Victor had jumped during the routine, and he had far more reason not to take the risk than Yuuri. He didn’t argue it though, he didn’t even know which jumps were going to go where, yet, so he launched into it, a rough rendition of the first few minutes of what Victor had shown him. It was sloppy, hardly even a shadow of what it was supposed to be, but Victor only corrected him at specific points, only on the technical aspects and not on the more elegant ones: the way he raised his arms, held them out, the sweeping passion of the movements that he lacked.

But as the week passed, he became more and more critical, calling out constantly, “Arms straighter, further forward,” as he moved from the first gesture, and “Your leg needs to be higher, your posture isn’t right,” when he slid into the first spin. And then, when there was not enough critique left, Victor joined him on the ice, walking him through the movements himself, slow, Yuuri mirroring the way he moved.

Then, after two weeks, there were only the most minor of changes, not counting the sloppiness, the need to actually master the program (where now he only mimicked what Victor showed him, but mastery would come with time and practice.) And those small corrections Victor made physically, guiding his arm through a motion, hands gentle, correcting the posture he needed in his spin, gloved hands running down his leg, turning his calf, a hand on his lower back, urging him forward. It was strangely intimate, and Yuuri blushed as Victor practically manhandled him through different motions, and Yuuri knew what the problem was that Victor was trying so hard to correct.

He lacked the passion that Victor had had when he had performed it for him. Yuuri sought it out, performing both to the music and not, but without the music in his ears he struggled to hear it in his head, to sing the music in his movements, instead of out loud.

But he had it down, none the less, everything save for the smallest touches which he himself had to adjust to, and Victor watched with a smile. He had everything down except the jumps, which Victor still refused to allow him to perform during the routine.

He jumped otherwise, during warmups, singles, as Victor thought he was ready, and then doubles, which he landed with as much ease as he had before his injury. But Victor insisted he not incorporate them into his program yet, to wait until he had all the jumps down again before he did. But that was what he was missing in the routine: the passion and the adrenaline that came from the jumps, which made up the flesh and bones of any program. Without them it was a spectre of what it was supposed to be, and as another week passed with perfectly landed jumps during warmups and practices, but still no word of when they could be brought into the routine, Yuuri found himself growing more and more frustrated.

Victor was still mum, even, about his beginning triples and quads, and he itched to do them. Soon, he kept saying, and one week bled into another and still, soon , he said, even as he began running him through pieces Yuuri knew would probably come together into his short program.

And his ankle was fine , holding steady more and more with every new movement he again mastered, and the throb of pain in it had begun to fade with each passing day. He was so quickly approaching something akin to where he had been that it angered him to have Victor insist, again and again, that he wasn’t ready. And Victor himself was frustrated, as he still failed again and again to replicate the choreography as he was supposed to.

And driven as they both were to frustration, Yuuri stopped listening to him slowly but surely, slipped back into his previous practice method of pushing himself beyond his limits. He refused to let Victor tell him when to stop, and so he insisted he was good to go again when the man asked, even when he wasn’t, even when he thought he might be sick from exhaustion.

Then a week later, when Victor had him run through the entire program, start to finish, once more, Yuuri was tired and exhausted and his entire body hurt and it only made him angrier that Victor’s sharp eyes were on him, judging him. No anxiety, all of the usual uneasiness swallowed up by irritation. So when he came to the final moments of the program, where he knew the final and most technically difficult jump would be, a quad flip, that Victor had told him would be there just a few days earlier, he jumped it, adrenaline driving him. It was exhilarating to be off the ground as he was, spinning hard and fast, and he landed it with only the slightest wobble, and followed through on the movement after, arms raised, and there it was, the passion the rest of it was lacking, the part that made his heart sing.

And when he finished, Victor was livid, and there was the anxiety, back again with how spent he finally realized he was. “I told you not to jump yet,” Victor said carefully as Yuuri fumbled his guards on, staggering from the ice. “Least of all a quad !” And there it was, louder, the anger more apparent. “What were you thinking, Yuuri? You can barely stand, let alone—”

The anxiety melted into something redder and angrier, and Yuuri lashed out because he didn’t really know what else to do. “I was thinking I wanted to jump, and I did! I’m ready, I’ve been ready!” Yuuris’ breath came fast, his legs uneasy in his skates on the solid ground, his hands curled into fists at his sides.

“No, you aren’t,” Victor snapped back, and his voice was losing itself to a thicker accent, his English almost lost to it, but Yuuri understood him well enough. “I’m your coach, I decide when you’re ready, and you’re barely landing your doubles without— Without stumbling, and— A quad, Yuuri? You’re not ready for quads, again.” Victor ran an aggravated hand through his hair, turning it messy. Yuuri would have thought it was a nice look on him, at any other time, but he didn’t. He hated everything about Victor in that moment, even his stupid hair and the dumb flirty smiles he always sent his way. “You don’t respect your own limits—”

“I know my limits,” Yuuri hissed, not missing a beat. “And you’re— You’re holding me back! Is that why Yuri Plisetsky fired you?” And Victor’s eyes went wide and, oh, that was personal, and it drove him onwards. Victor looked more upset than angry, now, and Yuuri fed off of that. “Were you holding him back, too?”

And it definitely hurt the man, because he took a step back, his hands uncurling from their fists, shaking. And he took a long, deep breath that rattled him. Yuuri had long since lost track of his own breathing, could no longer remember or tell if he was breathing often enough or if the pounding of his heart was from the exhaustion of his body or his anger. He didn’t stop, though, as upset as he was clearly making Victor. “I know my limits,” he pushed again. “And— And you’ve never once stopped to ask me if I thought I was ready, if—”

“You don’t,” Victor said, again, but he almost sounded defeated. “You didn’t know your limits when you fell, and you didn’t know them when you were falling apart before your program last year.”

Yuuri’s heart stopped, and if his breathing was rough and too fast before, it was even more so now. He felt, suddenly, as if he was drowning, and he staggered backwards and down onto the bench. Victor stepped forward, as if to reach for him, and Yuuri knocked his hand away. He recoiled back, eyes soft.

“Did you think he didn’t tell me?” he murmured softly. “I was his coach , Yuuri.” Victor knew, and Yuuri thought of the angry blond’s expression when he had found him, of how numb and shaky he had been when he stepped out onto the ice that day. The way he’d had to be held up by Celestino as he went to the kiss and cry. That was really where he had been, and he was near that point again. And Victor knew .

“Was I—” Yuuri looked down at the ground, leaning forward, fighting back tears. “Was I— Was I a pity case? Was that why you came here, to be my coach?”

“No, of course not, Yuuri, that isn’t why—”

No, that had to be why, Yuuri thought, why else would he have shown up before the news of his injury even finished making its rounds. He’d come for redemption, to pick up where he had left off with Yuri Plisetsky, because he’d been chased away by him, just as Yuuri was chasing him away now. “Go,” he said softly, and he lifted his eyes to Victor, who looked hurt, as if he himself was on the verge of tears. “Just go .”

And he did.

—

It took Yuuri what felt like hours to compose himself, thankful for the silence in the rink, but soon enough Yuuko arrived to open up and he was forced to plaster a weak smile across his face. He hurriedly unlaced his skates and tossed them into his bag, deflecting Yuuko’s worried look as he walked past her at the entry.

“Did something happen?” she asked, and Victor’s absence with him at the rink was as loud as a scream in his ear, and certainly she noticed it as well.

“Everything’s fine,” he told her, avoiding her gaze, and then he left, putting one foot in front of the other only with sheer will power and the adrenaline that still remained from the fight.

Everything was fine, and maybe if he told himself that enough times it would become true.

But it wouldn’t. He had messed up more than ever, and Victor was going to leave his life now as abruptly as he had shown up in it. This was it.

And Victor hadn’t quite been right, even so. He did know his limits, but he refused to respect those limits. A limit was only a challenge to push through, a barrier to overcome. But eventually he couldn’t anymore, he’d reached the end.

But in the rush remaining from his fight, the only thing he cared about was that he had been right.

Mari was there when he finally returned home, slouched against the counter at the entrance to the hotspring, and she regarded him lazily for only a moment before pulling herself upright, eyes suddenly sharp. “What happened?” she asked, and Yuuri wondered if it was the expression on his face or Victor’s earlier appearance without him that helped her put two and two together. No doubt Victor had returned, was likely in his own room packing his bags as they spoke.

Yuuri averted his gaze, and shook his head. Normally he appreciated her support, but now all he wanted was to be alone. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he murmured, and she nodded.

“Alright,” she told him. “But I’m here if you need me.”

He headed upstairs to his room and only paused a moment outside of Victor’s room to listen for any sound of movement, but he heard nothing, not even Makkachin. He wasn’t sure what he would’ve done if he had been there, but he felt relieved he wasn’t there all the same.

His room was cold and dead quiet when he walked in, same as it always was but somehow it was less welcoming than ever. He threw his bag into a corner, and then threw himself onto his bed, finally letting it out, screaming into his pillow until his throat was raw. And he cried, for what felt like forever, for his career, for the look on Victor’s face as he had finally left, for his own stupid, stupid stupidity, and Victor’s stupid face and smile and—

Maybe it wasn’t too late, maybe if he apologized, Victor wouldn’t leave, and at long last he snapped himself out of it, his breathing finally calm, the only thing left of his panic attack the red rings around his eyes and the tremor in his hands. Maybe if he found Victor before he left, he could—

He stumbled to his feet and froze before he could reach his door. There on the wall across from his bed was the poster he kept hanging there of Victor, his favorite poster of Victor, when the man had been young and alive and at the peak of his career, dressed in an outfit of black and silver sequins that spilled across his body like glass. He looked fragile in a way Yuuri had never noticed before. It was a year before his fall, and Yuuri had looked at that poster every single day for years and he had never noticed before how tired Victor looked in it, behind his soft smile. And it was fake, it was obvious it was fake, and Yuuri had never noticed before.

Victor and his stupid smile and tired eyes, slowly reaching his own limit.

It fell into place, slowly, and he crossed the distance to the door in only a moment, flinging it open and running straight into Victor, who had been standing on the other side. How long had he been there, debating whether or not to knock? Yuuri didn’t care, because he was there now, he hadn’t left , and he threw his arms around him and buried his face in his chest, and Victor smelled of the ocean and freshly shed tears.

“I came to—” Victor trailed off, sliding an arm around him. “I came to apologize.”

Yuuri pulled away, eyes wide, and finally looked at Victor’s face, and it was a rougher reflection of his face in the poster, older and sadder and exhausted with life in a way Yuuri understood too well. “I—” He trailed of, not sure what to say, but Victor filled the silence.

“Can I come in?”

He nodded faintly and moved from the doorway and Victor followed him in, closing the door softly behind him. It was awkward, the way it had been between them the first few weeks, and Yuuri hesitated and watched as Victor fell back against the door and slid slowly down to the floor and, alarmed, he dropped down next to him, kneeling. But Victor’s eyes weren’t on him, they were on the poster of himself just over his shoulder.

“I’m not the idol you think I am,” he said after a moment, so softly Yuuri almost didn’t hear him over the loud beating of his own heart. “I’m just a man.”

Yuuri understood that much, had for a while, had more and more by the day, in the small sad moments he had when he watched Yuuri skate, in his harsher moments when he was critical, in the small, lingering touches every now and again. In the fight they had had earlier, in the look on his face as Yuuri had exploded at him.

Victor sighed and let his head fall back against the wall, eyes still on the poster. “And I’m not proud of the person I was then, when I was still skating.” He reached out and caught Yuuri’s hand in his own, dragging a thumb across his knuckles. “Yakov used to tell me I only ever thought of myself, and that’s probably the truest thing I can say about that time in my life. I was—” He paused, struggling to find the words in English. “Self absorbed?” It flowed awkwardly from his tongue, like saying the word gave it power over him. He let go of Yuuri’s hand and Yuuri let his touch lingered, desperate not to lose it but he lost it all the same. “I remember you, though. You competed alongside me.”

It startled him, because Yuuri had always assumed Victor didn’t remember him, because not once had he really acknowledged him during that time.

“I remember, you took bronze twice, silver once. You only lost to me by a narrow margin, because of my fall.” He was right. Yuuri had taken silver that year because Victor had fallen, toppling from a shoe in for gold down to barely fourth place. It had been his free skate, right at the end, and he had placed high enough just in his short program to land that place, even so. And so Yuuri had taken silver, when otherwise he would have taken bronze. And without Victor there at the next year’s Grand Prix, he had taken his first gold at the event. Victor hadn’t placed high enough in the prior events to make it there.

“I’m surprised you know that,” he whispered, shocked, and Victor dropped the sad smile into a frown.

“I remember, but you were only competition in my eyes. Competition I knew I could beat. And doesn’t that say a lot about me?”

Yuuri didn’t think so, because he had begun to move into similar territory. He never worried about whether he would win or lose, just how everyone else would see him if he won or lost. And the other skaters were just competiton, not through any semblance of confidence or cockiness but because he’d always been too anxious to really get to know any of them. “You’re not like that now, though,” Yuuri insisted, and Victor smiled again.

“Tell me Yuuri, you were there when I fell.” Not just there, he had been watching in the stands, leaning against the rails, excited to watch him, exhausted, as well, from his own program. He’d been pushing himself hard back then, but he had been only 20, and his body hadn’t yet begun to rebel against him. “What was I doing?”

And Yuuri, who knew so much about Victor, far more than he had allowed Victor to know about himself, still struggled to recall that moment: Victor, sweeping across the ice, launching into a jump which he fumbled, the first proper fumble anyone had seen from in years, and he only barely recovered enough to set up for his next jump, but his footing had still been wrong— “It was a quad,” he said quietly. It had been the last quad of his program, and he’d struggled through the program from the beginning and everyone watching could tell he was off his game. But the fall, the severity of it, had still come as a surprise.

Yuuri shift, moving and settling properly onto the floor, next to Victor. And he caught Victor’s hand again, entwining his fingers with his, and Victor squeezed his hand tight.

“Not just any quad,” Victor murmured. “A quad flip,” his signature move. “And I was injured even before reaching the Final,” he continued, and that was news to Yuuri. “I hurt myself during a jump at the Rostelecom Cup earlier that year. Yakov, my coach, wanted me to drop out but I was stubborn and I hid it and went to the Final anyway.” Victor turned his head ever so slightly, meeting Yuuri’s eyes and they were puffy from his own tears, wet with ones threatening to spill over. “And of course, rather than taking it easy the night before, I went out.” And Yuuri knew exactly what he meant. Victor had been notoriously out going, and he often went out with the other skaters. Yuuri had been invited out too but he had turned it down as he always did.

“So I was tired, and well past my limit, and injured. I skated myself straight into my fall.”

Yuuri let him fall silent and looked to the poster again. It had been his last proper season, and already the signs were there. Yuuri wondered if the signs had been there in him, as well, if the worried glances from Celestino had been a foreshadowed warning that he had ignored. And he didn’t speak for a long while, neither of them did.

Until Victor cleared his throat and Yuuri glanced back over and, alarmed, realized he had been crying silently next to him, hand tight around his. Yuuri moved and swiped a thumb over his cheek, wiping away the tears, and it was a mirror of the motion from the banquet the year before. Victor smiled through it all, taking a deep, ragged breath.

“Yuri Plisetsky didn’t fire me,” he said suddenly and Yuuri started, pulling his hand back. They’d come finally come full circle back to their conversation from earlier, their fight. “I quit, shortly before the banquet.”

Yuuri swallowed, nervous. “Did you quit, to be my coach?”

He shook his head, and he seemed calmer now, his voice steadier. “I quit because he was becoming like me, he was falling apart, he pushed too hard, too fast, and he wasn’t ready. His body wasn’t ready, even.” He sighed, running a hand through his hair, and this time the mess it left was anything but stupid. It was nice, and he was human, so very human, Yuuri thought. “There was no getting through to him, after so long, and so I quit because I couldn’t be a part of that. He won’t make it to twenty, at the rate he’s going.” And there was a lingering sadness, and Yuuri remembered the angry blond boy sneering at him the year before and his stomach dropped, but there was relief there as well. Yuri was in no better shape than he had been, and maybe that was why he had judged him so hard. He’d seen a reflection of what he was becoming, and he’d hated it.

“I’m sorry,” Yuuri said after a moment. “That I said he must’ve fired you.” And Victor shrugged.

“He didn’t take it well, either way. I’ve probably burned that bridge forever.”

And Yuuri had almost burned that same bridge with Victor, and no wonder he had looked so upset at the mention of Yuri. He had just thrown salt into a wound already there. “And I’m sorry,” Yuuri continued. “About before. I shouldn’t have— I should have trusted your judgement.”

Victor turned and met his eyes and there was something else there now, something more than sadness and anguish. “Do you want to know what happened at the banquet last year?” he asked, in lieu of accepting the apology, and Yuuri told himself that it wasn’t a rejection of it, either.

And Yuuri wanted to know, had wanted to know since the first time Victor had mentioned it, and he nodded now, because maybe it was past time.

Victor smiled softly. “We danced,” he told him. “We danced and danced, and made quite the scene with the other skaters, and maybe all of us took the chance to enjoy ourselves for the first time in a while. This life— We all want it, but I suspect at some level none of us enjoy it very long.” He wasn’t wrong. Yuuri had been tired since he’d hit twenty, had spent every year more unhappy but desperate to skate, because it helped with the misery and the anxiety. But really, it was just another way to push himself hard enough into some twisted form of punishment.

He loved to skate, he didn’t love everything that came with it.

“You were happy,” Victor said and his smile reached his eyes and he reached out and stroked Yuuri’s face. “And I was happy, for the first time in as long as I could remember.”

Yuuri smiled too, and he thought that was the end of it, but then Victor frowned and dropped his hand away. “I took you back to your room after, because you were drunk, and it seemed the right thing to do. And you cried, because you said you hadn’t been happy like that in so long. That you wished that moment could last forever, so you didn’t have to go back to it all. And you told me you loved skating, and the only time you were ever happy was when you were on the ice.” Yuuri’s blood ran cold, because there was the part of it that mattered. Victor had known from the beginning. “And it reminded me of myself, because I wasn’t happy either. I hadn’t been happy since long before I fell. And when I fell, it was the worst moment of my life, but I was relieved, because it was over.”

Tears pulled in Yuuri’s eyes and he sniffed, fighting them back.

“In that moment, there in the hallway with you, I knew I wanted more of that, I wanted to help you, because you made me happy even though I barely knew you,” Victor breathed it to him, face now only inches from his, “I connected with you. You reminded me of myself, and it was too late for Yuri Plisetsky, but it wasn’t too late for you, because you could see it, you could see the direction you were headed. And when I found out you had pushed yourself too hard, that you had fallen—”

“You came here, to be my coach,” he whispered, and all he wanted to do in that moment was close the distance between them, to kiss him. He didn’t, though, and the moment passed. Victor pulled away.

“It wasn’t pity, I wanted to be here, with you,” he said. “And I’ve been so happy here, for the first time in too long.” He sighed. “And I overstepped, because I was worried you’d over do it again, and it might all go down the drain. And so I’m the one who’s sorry. I should have respected your choices, I should have communicated with you better.” He fidgeted, thumb sliding back and forth across Yuuri’s hand. “I was projecting, and it wasn’t fair to you. But— Talk to me, please . You can’t keep doing this.” He took a deep breath. “And I want to stay as your coach, if you want me to be.”

Yuuri’s mouth was dry as he answered, squeezing Victor’s hand. “Yeah,” he said. “I’d like that,” because he was happy too, with Victor there, for the first time in a long time.

Chapter Text

The next month went by dizzyingly fast. Yuuri relearned every jump, one by one, and performed then again and again until he thought he could almost do them in his sleep. But he was careful: he stopped when Victor told him they should stop and he stopped when he felt he needed to. And it worked, that way. With less fatigue and exhaustion weighing him down Yuuri found he had begun to improve at a faster rate.

Was he where he was the prior year? He couldn’t say and he stopped thinking about it after a while. He would be where he would be the coming season and no amount of comparing himself to who he was before would change that. And, always, Victor was there the moment he thought the self doubt would return and overwhelm him. He didn’t know how Victor always seemed to know but he did, and he was there .

Soon enough he was running through his short program, Victor out on the ice with him, walking him through every subtle movement as he envisioned it. It was a different beast entirely from what the free skate had been. Victor had planned something rigorous, perhaps having reworked his concept after their fight, but even Yuuri doubted he could pull it off.

Yuuri had told him as much, that maybe he wasn’t up for all of that yet, which was a step for him to even say because before he would have done it, even if it was beyond his limits. All of them were jumps he had down before but now still struggled to land cleanly. And he lacked the stamina, still, for some of the spins he was to pull off.

“I’m not expecting you to have this all down, not right away, of course,” Victor had clarified. “But by the time you reach the Final? I think that should be the goal for now.” And Yuuri had laughed and responded, “There’s no guarantee I’ll even make it to the Final,” and Victor’s frown had been stern. “Of course you’ll make it to the Final,” he’d whispered and so Yuuri had pushed all doubt from his mind. They were three months out, now, from the Cup of China. There was plenty of time left for him to worry about it later.

And now they were at the rink, Victor out on the ice, preparing to show him the final, completed short program. He performed it for him as he had the free skate, laptop set up nearby and playing the heavy melody of Conquest of Paradise , only he looked more ragged and tired than before, favoring his movements across the ice with his left leg, which gave an awkward stutter to the program. Yuuri knew he hadn’t been sleeping well but he hadn’t pressed him for answers yet, though he already knew the cause.

It was becoming more clear by the day that so much time on the ice with Yuuri had been having a negative impact on his knee. And Yuuri wanted to ask about it often but bit his tongue every time, not wanting to overstep. Victor now trusted him to know his limits and to tell him when he reached them, and he had , and so he trusted Victor to tell him the same in turn, though he suddenly found himself wanting details that weren’t really his place to ask for: What was his injury to begin with, specifically, how bad had it really been? And all he really knew was that it was his knee, and he could still vividly remember how Victor had gone down. All grace gone save for the way he slid as he hit the ice. Yuuri couldn’t even remember the motion he had made when he’d flubbed his jump, only that his skates had made a violent shink across the ice only a moment before and his coach had helped him off the ice as the audience whispered in hushed tones.

And the pain from that day was there as he skated the short program for Yuuri, but even with the more awkward movements the program was still breathtaking: It had all the passion of the free skate but it was fire where the other was love. Victor slid through most of the more technical aspects, the jumps, the intensive step movement, even a spin, but Yuuri could fill in most of the blanks. He knew the requirements of the program and Victor had already walked him through what he expected of him. A highly technical program that Victor himself would never again be able to skate, not fully anyway.

But Yuuri would skate it, and that would have to be enough.

Yuuri joined him out on the ice as he finished and came to a slow stop by the edge of the rink. He leaned on the top of the dasher board and Yuuri drew up next to him.

“The final program needs to be faster,” he told him, dragging a hand through sweat damp silver locks. He looked haggard, bags under his eyes, the creases of his face more prominent, and Yuuri reached out and ran his thumb across his jaw line. Victor caught his wrist as he did so but he didn’t pull away. “It needs to be much faster, it’ll be probably the hardest part of the program,” he continued when Yuuri finally let go, and he breathed it out as if sighing.

Yuuri pushed away, enjoying the rough slide of his blades across the ice, drifting slowly away from Victor. He felt good, he felt better than he had in so long and Victor had been that wake up call, in a way. He laughed and Victor grinned and slid after him. “I can do that,” Yuuri said, spreading his arms. Two minutes and fifty seconds it had to come down to, and Victor had taken almost twice that to perform it at his slower pace, not counting the higher technicalities he hadn’t performed as part of it. But Yuuri could do it, it was an easy challenge compared to having to relearn to skate all over again as he already had.

But that would come later, now he just wanted to skate for the sake of skating and he wanted Victor there with him. Practice was practice was practice but this was different. It was early evening and the rink was closed and it was just the two of them and the dwindling light outside, the beauty of a red-pink sunset casting colors across the rink.

Victor took his cue and caught up to him, catching his hand, and Yuuri pulled him closer. Victor was smiling again and Yuuri had never before realized how much he loved Victor’s smiles until he realized they were for him. And Victor was vibrant and happy through his fatigue and his eyes glistened with the tail end of his laughter as Yuuri dragged him across the ice gently. And then he let go and they moved in unison, Yuuri moving backwards in faster, sweeping motions, Victor following after in a mirror of every gesture he made, the two of them skating pieces of the routine they both loved so much, through the music was wrong. But they didn’t need it, because Yuuri understood, suddenly, the type of passion Victor had been trying to get him to recreate. They skated, but they skated the music to life and their own hearts into the heart of the program, and the passion missing from his free skate was there, now, in their rough rendition of it. He was skating for two, where he had been trying to skate it alone, before. His heart, which beat faster with every graceful sweep of his arms, was the heartbeat of him and another. He was not simply skating but telling a story, a story meant for two.

He pulled away from Victor and slid properly into the program, arms reaching high as he moved, as he finally came around into the first jump, and then the next. And when he spun around again, reaching outwards, now, instead of upwards, it was Victor he reached for, who stood transfixed in the middle of the rink, and their eyes met only briefly before Yuuri moved into the next jump and then into the next spin.

By the time he stopped, after the first long spin, he realized Victor still hadn’t moved and he looked to him, smiling, only to find tears in his eyes. His smile dropped and he skated over, and he only barely heard Victor whisper, “I always wanted to skate it,” over the shink of his skates across the ice. He stood, eyes cast upwards, the dying light casting long shadows across his face.

He was sad, in the same way he had been when Yuuri had first heard the music and fallen in love with it, and he remembered this was going to be Victor’s to skate and he had passed the mantle to him and now saw it as it was supposed to be, as he had envisioned it in his head. Yuuri swept forward and came to a slow stop in front of him, catching both of Victor’s hands in his, and it was Victor who flushed red at the touch, for once.

“I’ll skate it for both of us,” Yuuri declared. “With everything I have, with all of my passion and my love, for you ,” and Victor pushed forward and into him, arms around him, pulling him into a tight hug, swallowing Yuuri in his height, the warmth of his body, and he would have been content to stay there forever, in his arms like that.

In the background, Conquest of Paradise played softly.

—

They spent more time between practice enjoying themselves; They went down to the beach when it was warm enough, always late in the evening, after the crowds had left, and Victor was delighted by the ocean. “It’s always too cold in Russia,” he told him, feet buried in the sand. “I live by the water, but I’ve never been to the beach like this.” And ‘like this’ was in swimsuits and towels and with wet sand between their toes. And ‘like this’ was with him and with Makkachin, who ran along behind them, leaving soft pawprints in the sand, and a sunset that stretched out for miles, beautiful.

Victor stood with his feet in the waves and it reminded him of that first night down at the shore together, when Yuuri had been anxious in his presence and now it felt like forever ago. Three months and a fight and tears, but also happiness and joy like he hadn’t felt in so long. And his programs and his skating, beautiful like it had never been before with Victor’s help.

And now they were having fun together, which had been far and few inbetween before. One day it was the beach and the next Yuuri took him through the markets, and though he was certain Victor had seen it before he was excited all the same, as if it were the first time, asking Yuuri to translate everything around them. And he bought Yuuri lunch and they ate together at a food stall, and it was nice and almost domestic. “Like a date,” Victor joked, and Yuuri had thought much the same but he only laughed it off.

Victor flooded social media with photos of them out and about and Yuuri found he was comfortable with that. Phichit texted him almost constantly now, teasing remarks about he and Victor, screenshots of the latest photo and an insinuating comment. Yuuri only told him the truth: there was nothing to tell, nothing else going on as Phichit implied with humorous strings of emojis. But it was nice, all the same, to be so in touch with him again.

Victor asked a lot more questions now that Yuuri was more amenable to answering, where before he had shied away from them. He asked about his childhood, about his beginnings in skating, about college and how he enjoyed the states.

“I’ve been to so many countries,” Yuuri answered idly, but Victor understood that much because he had been too, as a skater and as a coach. And Yuuri had been to Spain and to China and to Canada and to Germany and to England. “America was just another to add to the list. It was alright.” He hadn’t hated it, but he hadn’t enjoyed it that much either, because it had mostly been dragged down by the stress of school and maintaining his skating career and missing home. And his fall. He had fallen there. And maybe that was the culmination of his feelings about the states. It had been the low point in his career.

And Victor asked about Phichit, because he had no doubt noticed how often his friend now texted him. “You’ll be competing against him in the Cup of China,” Victor said, and they stood, now, on the bridge overlooking the water, watching the ebb and flow of the coming tide from where they stood.

“Yeah, I’m nervous,” Yuuri admitted, “He’s been my friend for so long.”

“He’ll still be your friend,” Victor said, laughing. “Even when you beat him, you’ll still be his friend.” And it was always when and not if with Victor. His confidence in Yuuri was unwavering and it helped. Positivity for the upcoming season would set a good foundation for it, Victor had told him once, when he had called the man out on perhaps being too certain in his ability to sweep through the event in a landslide.

Yuuri thought about Phichit and he had skated alongside him long enough to know his weaknesses and his strengths. And they were opposites to him. Phichit mastered spins, was so adept at them, while Yuuri was phenomenal at step sequences. Jump wise Yuuri had surpassed him a while ago, but no doubt he was catching up quickly.

“But your bigger concern should be Yuri Plisetsky,” Victor continued. “You’ll be facing him in the Rostelecom Cup. It’s his senior debut, and I’ve seen him skate, helped him skate. He’s going to be difficult to beat.” It was the only doubt Victor had shown thus far, and Yuuri took it to heart, because Victor had been Yuri’s coach and Victor had once been one of the best. “Yuri is very—” He trailed off and Yuuri wasn’t certain if the words alluded him in English or if the boy was truly so difficult to describe. Victor didn’t finish, though, and only shrugged, hands in his pockets.

Yuuri didn’t want to think about it, because the Rostelecom Cup was almost three months away and there was too much time left between now and then to be filled with worry about it. That would come soon enough, but for now he was content just to enjoy Victor’s company. “Are you excited to be back in Russia?” Yuuri asked, changing the subject. He’d turned the questions on Victor often and the man had answered many of them but avoided those that spoke deeper about him: his family, his time as a skater, his childhood.

Victor shrugged again. “It’ll be nice to be back, certainly.” And Yuuri pushed, because he was curious.

“You never really talk about it. Russia, I mean.”

“I miss my apartment,” he said at last. “It was lovely, just me and Makkachin. And I miss Yuri, as silly as it sounds. Plisetsky, I mean. It’s confusing, isn’t it, that you two share a name?”

Yuuri shook his head. “It’s different when you say it,” Yuuri explained. “There’s a different pronunciation between how you say his and how you say mine. When you say my name it has more—” Yuuri hesitated. It had more what? Warmth, he supposed, and affection, but he let the sentence die on his tongue. Victor could no doubt fill in the blanks as he wanted to.

“He was like a younger brother to me,” Victor whispered into the sea breeze that suddenly blew past, and that was all that was said on the subject.

—

“You never talk about your knee,” Yuuri said one day, finally, after weeks of building up to it, of pretending he didn’t notice the way Victor sometimes limped. They were both spread across Victor’s bed and they were watching something stupid on his laptop, a Japanese sitcom that Yuuri had been translating off and on for him. But Victor sat with one knee bent awkwardly and Yuuri noticed.

The sitcom played on, with the occasional burst of laughter trickling staticy through the speakers, even as Yuuri slid it aside, ignoring it. Victor’s arm disappeared from where it had been draped around his shoulders but Yuuri didn’t protest, only turned to meet his eyes. “Does it always hurt this often? Or has skating with me so much made it worse?”

Victor’s expression was unreadable and he sighed, running a hand through his hair, sweeping it away from his face. “A bit of both,” he admitted, “But I have chronic knee pain, now. I’m used to it.” Yuuri frowned and he could tell by the way Victor’s eyes softened that he knew his response didn’t really answer his question. “I tore my ACL, when I fell,” he finally said. “ Badly , and my first surgery didn’t take, so I had to have another after my final season.” His final season, where he had skated abysmally. “And even before that I was beginning to develop tendonitis.”

Yuuri caught his hand and twined their fingers together.

“But to answer your question, yes. It hurts me often and sometimes it's worse.”

Yuuri swallowed. “You shouldn’t be on the ice with me so often, if it makes it worse,” Yuuri whispered, gaze dropping down to their joined hands.

“That’s just part of being a coach, and I enjoy being on the ice. The pain is worth it,” his thumb stroked small circles across Yuuri’s knuckles and he looked up, blushing, only to find Victor’s face now inches from his own. “Especially if I’m out there with you. I enjoy being by your side, Yuuri.” Even now Yuuri was by his side and they had both become unabashedly comfortable with each other’s presence. And now Yuuri was hardly fazed by the small touches, the hand holding, Victor’s arm around his shoulders, only now, with Victor so close, he blushed like a teenager with a crush.

Oh. Oh

He flushed all the harder at the sudden understanding that came over him, as if a word he had long struggled to find, trapped on the tip of his tongue, had finally come to him. Oh . He remembered, suddenly, have you ever had a girlfriend and he had been so horrified to answer it at the time. But now— “Have you ever had a girlfriend, Victor?” he echoed, and Victor frowned, startled.

“What a tangent,” he said, smile returning, but this time playful. It was an improvement over the previous mood that had fallen over the room. “But no, Yuuri. I’ve never had a girlfriend. Not in the proper sense.” Yuuri wondered if Victor had read into his own answer as much as he was now reading into Victor’s, because he was. He definitely, definitely was. “Why the sudden interest, hmm, Yuuri?” Victor continued and his grin was positively lascivious. Yuuri blushed hard and he knew he saw it. He reached out, hesitant, and combed his free hand through Victor’s hair, finally settling it around the back of his neck. “Is there something you want to tell me, Yuuri?” Victor murmured.

Yuuri gulped. “I’ve never had a girlfriend either,” Yuuri whispered.

“For the same reason I’ve never had one?”

And Yuuri nodded, throat tight, heart pounding. He was here, in Victor’s bed, in Victor’s shirt because he had been cold and the man had tossed him one of his own to put on, and it swallowed him in its size, just as Yuuri drowned in the smile Victor was giving him.

And it was Yuuri that finally, finally , closed the distance between them.9