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"I didn't think it would last anyway."
It was unfair how beautiful Yuuri looked in the afternoon light.
They sat across one another in that small cafè. It was just the two of them there at the time, which was good, considering what was happening. Yuuri had a dark blue sweater on, a brown jacket, and a grey scarf hanging off his neck.
Between them on the table were a set of keys and a gold ring.
"Thank you for everything, Viktor."
Viktor stared at the key and the ring as though he did not recognise them.
"Yuuri." He swallowed thickly and slowly looked up to look at that dearly familiar face. "What is this? What do you mean you did not think it would last?"
Yuuri's smile was sad when he looked down, not meeting Viktor's eyes. "It was too good to be true from the start anyway," he said. "We have been fighting a lot recently and that actually makes a lot more sense. I used to worry, but now I... this just seems to be for the best. I am glad to have had what I did."
"What does that even mean? What about me, Yuuri?"
So many things flashed through Viktor's mind. Yuuri coming over their table, hot and drunk and shooting Viktor with a look so filthy he blushed up to the roots of his hair. Yuuri in that video, skating to Stammi Vicino and looking vastly different, but still amazing, just maybe in a different way. Yuuri in Japan, out of shape but still as adorable as he was at that strange banquet after the Grand Prix Final where they met. Yuuri telling Viktor all his stories in Hasetsu. Yuuri against the Christmas lights in Barcelona. Yuuri in a tux underneath an archway, smiling a brilliant smile as they signed their names together on the contract between them. Yuuri with messy hair in the morning. Yuuri with a blush, looking back at Viktor beneath the blankets before sunrise.
"I am glad to have what we have." He could not bring himself to say it - 'had', like the word Yuuri used. "I did not come in thinking it would ever end. Couples fight all the time."
"For the longest time, it all felt like a dream," said Yuuri. "I'm actually relieved. It was getting weird anyway, waiting for the other shoe to drop, show me when it would all end."
It apparently ends like this, with Yuuri calling the shots, deciding when to back out. Viktor's hands balled into fists on his lap. "You thought it would end eventually, but married me anyway?" Would it be strange, he wondered, if he cried in the middle of a cafè in St. Petersburg? "How selfish, Yuuri."
Yuuri met Viktor's eyes briefly, before bringing them down again. "Yes, you have said that before. I am sorry."
It was not even a significant fight. It was over some small thing, but maybe he could admit that it was one of many fights these days over petty things like a sock on the floor or burnt rice left on the cooker. Viktor had already forgotten what it was about this time, but he did remember Yuuri crying in the end. Yuuri left, and the next Viktor heard from him was through a text, asking him to come to this cafè.
"Yuuri." They fought a lot. Those things can happen to long-time couples. He did not expect this. "Yuuri, please. Please don't go."
"Thank you for everything, Viktor."
"Wait, Yuuri." Please listen. Why was he not listening?
"I will have someone get my things some time next week, if you don't mind. I just... I can't, anymore."
No. "Yuuri."
"Goodbye, Viktor."
Viktor shot up from bed and was met with darkness and quiet, save for the harsh sounds of his breaths. A quick check told him the space beside him on the bed was still empty, and immediately he was on his feet, padding to the door and out into the living room.
He jumped on the prone figure on the couch, who protested the attack with a shocked cry.
"Viktor!" Yuuri stared up at Viktor with wide eyes. There was a hint of sleep to them, which meant Viktor must have woken him up, but those same eyes were also red and swollen. It did not seem as if Yuuri had been asleep for long. "Oi, are you crazy? What are you doing?"
Viktor ignored the struggling man beneath him as he dug through the blankets to extract the other's hand. "Your hand," he said urgently, pulling at Yuuri's arm. "Show it to me."
"What? No! What are you--"
But Viktor was adamant and Yuuri was just confused, so that a split second later, the younger man's right hand was wrestled up between their faces. Yuuri's gold ring glinted in the moonlight streaming in from the windows.
"Hey..." More weakly now, as if the sight of the ring took the fight out of Yuuri. He looked away, refusing to meet Viktor's eyes. "Come on, let go. I am still upset with you, all right?"
"That's okay." Viktor released the breath he did not even know he was holding. He fell back on his ankles, sitting as he was astride Yuuri's lap. He blinked back the sudden stinging in his eyes, and he clutched the other man's wrists tight. "It's okay if you are still angry. But Yuuri..." His voice was low and controlled in a way he did not really feel. "No matter how angry you get, you will never leave me, will you?"
Yuuri looked even more confused. "Eh?"
He looked so adorable like that, as Yuuri often did, dark haired and wide eyed and with that boyish face that never failed to make Viktor's heart go aflutter.
Then the image of him in a dark blue sweater and brown jacket, smiling sadly in the afternoon light, flashed before Viktor's eyes. He groaned and buried his face on Yuuri's chest.
Yuuri seemed shocked to stillness when Viktor suddenly began clinging to him. "Um..."
"I had a bad dream," was muffled against the material of Yuuri's shirt.
"A bad dream." A brief pause, during which Yuuri seemed to finally understand what was going on. "I left you?"
Even remembering that scene was painful, so Viktor buried his nose even deeper against Yuuri's shoulder, nearly squishing his face in. His heart was like a great lead weight in his chest, he almost couldn't take it. Only the smell of soap and that warm, familiar scent of Yuuri that seeped through his shirt kept Viktor's head clear.
He heard Yuuri sigh beneath him.
"Did you seriously dream about me leaving you? Because we fought?"
Viktor's response was muffled by the other's shirt.
"What was that?"
That silver head rose from Yuuri's chest, revealing red eyes and a heavy frown. "I said that this is the first time we fought so badly that you slept on the couch."
Yuuri blinked back at Viktor. "Yes, well, that happens when you finally share rooms and a bed with somebody and they annoy you."
The sound that came out of Viktor was not quite a whine, per se, but... it was getting there. He dropped his head again on Yuuri's chest, wrapped his arms around him tighter, and just refused to move.
Yuuri sighed again.
"Viktor, this is ridiculous."
"Please." Please. "I just want to be here."
"Then you can take the couch. I'll go to bed."
Sometimes Yuuri can be so mean. Viktor felt the stinging in his eyes just as his hand balled into a fist against Yuuri's shirt.
"Viktor... oh my God. Are you crying? All right, all right. Don't cry. Geez."
A forlorn sniff. "So mean..."
"Sorry, sorry! Please don't cry, this is getting so weird and I--"
"Yuuri." He called to him now, like in the dream. Please, Viktor pleaded in his mind, like he had wanted to do back in that dream. Please Yuuri, let's stop this. Let's not fight anymore, let's make up, come back with me...
"Yes, yes. I am here, ssh." Viktor was not quite sure if he ended up voicing his thoughts out loud after all, but that no longer seemed to matter in the end because finally, Yuuri was holding him, warm arms coming up and around Viktor's shoulders and back. "Ssh, it was just a dream."
Viktor shut his eyes in that embrace and pressed his cheek against Yuuri's chest. "Yuuri, when I call you, promise me you will answer, and hold me just like this."
"O...kay?" Yuuri was so cute when he sounded confused. "Okay. I mean, what else would I do anyway?"
There were so many awful things Yuuri could do instead in response to Viktor calling and begging - like ignore him, return his keys, take off his ring. Viktor saw enough in that dream; he really did not want to think about them anymore.
"And this." He held up Yuuri's hand and pressed his lips firmly on the golden band around that precious ring finger. "This ring means that we will be together forever. You cannot give it back to me no matter how badly we fight."
"Er... yes, I know. The rings were my idea in the first place, after all."
"And we are married."
"I know that, too. I was there at the wedding."
"Marriages are permanent. It is not like a relationship where you just break up and that's it."
"Yes, thank you, I understand the difference. There was a seminar we had to sit through and everything."
It was only at this point that Viktor settled, relief finally flowing in again with every breath he took that was filled with the scent of the man beneath him.
"Sorry..." He should have said so earlier this evening. They should not have gone to bed angry.
There were gentle fingers carding through his hair now. If Viktor had a tail, it would be wagging at that point. "I'm sorry, too," he heard Yuuri say. "I might have said some mean things. I got upset first."
"I made you angry. I'm really sorry."
Yuuri's hands on him were heavenly. If Yuuri kept at it, Viktor wouldn't mind apologising for the rest of the night.
"Want to go back to bed?" asked Yuuri now in that gently shy voice, and oh, how Viktor missed that, what with all the awful things that were said earlier that evening.
"Please." Viktor lifted up his head and smiled adoringly up at his precious husband. "I love you."
"Yeah..." Yuuri's smile was sweet and maybe a bit exasperated when he returned it to Viktor. "I love you, too, you... crazy man." Yuuri chuckled and his eyes crinkled and yeah, Viktor can let him get away with that one jibe. Yuuri smiling at him was... it was the most beautiful thing in the world. Viktor felt his heart leap as Yuuri looked at him in that old, familiar way - warm and fond, every bit so sweet. "Let's go?"
Viktor wasted no time and pulled Yuuri by the hand, helped him gather up his blanket and pillow, and led them back to the bedroom. Yuuri laughed when Viktor wrapped him in their blankets and tucked him in like some precious thing, but that was fine because it was not far from the truth. He laughed again when Viktor forced him to turn, wrapped him in his arms and buried his nose in Yuuri's hair, entwining their hands so their rings were touching.
Yuuri can laugh and think Viktor silly all he wants, because the important thing was that he was back in bed, back in Viktor's arms, and Viktor was never ever letting him go.