Chapter Text
YouTube Star Victor Nikiforov’s Music is Heavily Inspired by Lilith
2017 was certainly an interesting, if not amazing, year for those in the music industry. Enigmatic singer/master lyricist Lilith has surprised the world with another Grammy Award, an Album of the Year, for his latest and fourth album “h e a r t b e a t”. With track number two “the problem with courage” being a smash-hit in nearly 28 countries, it is no surprise that Lilith is headed on a world tour that is lovingly called “pulse” by his nearly fifty million fans.
Lilith’s influence is so powerful that it can play with the outcome of the rest of the music industry, so it seems. Starting off as just a fan covering Lilith’s songs on YouTube, Victor Nikiforov has become quite a sensation for the Internet to behold. After three years on YouTube and after gaining seven million subscribers on his channel “silver”, the young YouTube star was signed to Yakov Records earlier this year. Though he hasn't completely finished it yet, according to his latest string of promotional interviews, his album “ode to transparency” will be debuting late this year. The synth-pop songs on the track are rumored to be an ode to his idol, Lilith, rather than transparency, inside sources had said, and this was confirmed by Victor himself in his last interview. When asked why he wrote his album and what influenced it, the singer sheepishly admitted that the name “Lilith” came to mind first, saying that Lilith “shaped [Victor’s] introduction into music.” Bold words, Victor, but fans love them all the same.
Regardless, the incredible fact remains that Victor Nikiforov has, like the rest of the world, has never met Lilith outside of his iconic disguise. Furthermore, Victor has never met Lilith at all, which is a shock to both of their fanbases, as Victor bases his songs –whether it be the genre or the general message– on Lilith. Music fans will just have to wait and see if the story unfolds further. Until then, we have to be patient until December for “ode to transparency”. You can wait and pass time by listening to Lilith’s latest album until it debuts. We reached out to both Lilith and Victor Nikiforov for comment, but received no response.
Victor sighed, clicking out of the article and shutting his phone off, slipping it into a pocket in his black trenchcoat. He scanned his eyes around the airport warily– he hadn’t anticipated for his last interview to throw the music world into a frenzy. Somehow, hordes of Lilith fans had found their way into his life; he had gained about one hundred thousand subscribers within the past four days. He had to practically live in his studio, as fans and reporters alike swarmed his apartment building. The only thing –or rather, person – barring them from pouring into the studio was Yakov. Eventually, though, he had gotten the chance to go home without too many prying eyes and insensitive questions from reporters.
He fiddled with a button on his coat. Home. He was supposed to be there now, writing the last song of his album with ease.
But he wasn’t.
He had found out that Lilith’s first show of “pulse” was in Los Angeles, and he had to go. Yakov nearly chained him to a chair in one of the recording studios but Victor knew that he couldn't miss this.
“I'll write on one of the planes,” he reasoned to Yakov, sounding infinitely more confident that he would write a life-altering song on a cramped metal tube filled with people he didn't know.
Yakov had been furious, but in the end, he let Victor go, knowing that if he didn't, Victor would be moping for months on end.
Looking back on it, his whole “disguise” for the airport was not a good idea– his favorite black trenchcoat and thick rimmed black glasses made him seem rather suspicious, attracting more attention to his bright blue eyes and grey hair. Victor raked a hand through the silver strands, grimacing slightly as he noticed they were starting to get a little too long for his liking. He would ask Lilia to trim his hair when he got home.
Victor’s eyes scanned a board for his flight number. This was a connecting flight –that's all he knew. Hell, he didn’t even know which city he was in– somewhere in Japan. The last flight he took was so painfully boring that he couldn't even write a full stanza. Instead of working on the song –which he had entitled “satin sunrise”– he had resigned himself to doing “research” and listening to Lilith’s first album.
He arrived a tiny bit late as a result of his last flight being delayed, but he was glad for it. There wasn’t going to be any waiting around, which meant that there was less of a chance that someone might recognize him. As he went through security and finally ended up at his gate, he glanced cavalierly at his boarding pass. 23B, it read. An aisle seat. He had wanted a window seat, preferring to see the world grow smaller right in front of his eyes as the plane took off, but he didn’t have a choice in the matter; after all, he had booked his flight extremely late.
Thankfully, he was in Zone One, so he was called into the airplane early. As he made his way down the aisle, he caught sight of a young, black-haired man looking down, scribbling something onto a piece of paper. Victor’s eyes flitted to the row number above the man. 23. He stowed his carry-on away quickly and slumped into his seat, the weariness of travel seeping into his skin.
He offhandedly glanced at the man sitting next to him.
“Good evening,” he said in slightly accented English.
The man next to him looked up sharply, as if being awoken from a vivid dream. “Same to you,” he said quietly.
The conversation quickly died there, and Victor couldn’t help but be slightly grateful. Brushing his untidy hair out of his eyes, he settled back into his seat. He was just about to fall asleep, eyelids burning with overuse and fatigue, when he heard a bloodcurdling scream. Standing frozen in the aisle next to him was a teenager wearing a YouTube sweatshirt, staring at him as if he had grown an extra arm.
“Oh my God,” the boy stuttered out. “Oh my God, can I have a photo with you?”
Victor smiled kindly, though traces of sweet, syrupy sleep lingered in the back of his mind.
“Of course,” he said, flashing him a grin. “What's your name?”
“Minami,” said the quivering child. “Oh my God, I love your music so much. The 'beneath the ice' EP saved my life.”
Victor smiled genuinely now, his heart filling with something light and airy. “That's something I love to hear. Thank you so much." He snapped a set of photos with Minami, throwing a cheesy peace sign up next to his face in half of them.
“Are you going to LA for the Lilith concert?” asked Minami excitedly.
This piqued the interest of the stranger next to him, Victor noticed. “Yes,” he responded. “I'm looking forward to it.”
The boy squealed, almost tripping over his own luggage, saying that he was going too and something about how cute Victor’s glasses were before he finally headed to his seat, still shaking with the euphoria of meeting one of his favorite singers.
“Lilith?” the stranger next to him said in amused tones. “That's interesting.”
“The whole world knows I'm obsessed with him,” Victor replied rather sheepishly, cheeks tinged with a bit of color. “And he doesn't even know I exist.”
“I wouldn't be so sure.” The man wore a smile that made Victor feel like he wasn’t in on the joke, if there was one.
He fiddled with his hair again, tugging gently at some of the strands. He caught the man staring at him with a curious expression.
“It's getting a bit too long for my taste,” he explained.
The man smiled. “It looks nice on you, actually.”
Victor immediately decided that he would never cut his hair short again.
“What's your name?” Victor blurted out, cheeks burning, unable to contain his curiosity. “I'm Victor.”
“Yuuri.” His answer was simple and short.
“Nice– I mean, that's a nice name.” Victor weakly attempted to further the conversation.
It was unsuccessful.
They settled into an uncomfortable silence: Yuuri reading something on his phone and Victor pulling out his notebook to write.
To Victor’s slight irritation, his mind fell back to Lilith, and what he must be doing right now. He was suddenly overcome with the fact that he was going to be in the same city as Lilith. Hell, he was going to be in the same venue.
He wondered what Lilith would look like live. Lilith usually wore a loose t-shirt and jeans, or something vaguely androgynous, other than the drastic measures that he took to cover his face. Victor had known Lilith was of Asian descent, but he quickly started wondering how his face would look, how flushed Lilith must be under his elaborate disguises and the heat of the stage lights... he immediately pushed those thoughts away, shaking his head slightly.
He focused his attention to the notebook on his tray table and wrote “satin sunrise” at the top of the page, scribbling down the meager lines that he had come up with before. He tries to shut out the world around him, focusing on the lines made by his pen.
And though try he did to focus, every so often, he stole glances at Yuuri. Victor’s first look found Yuuri leaning into the grooves of the airplane, knees tucked daintily to his chest, eyes shut tight, and breathing even and steady.
The second glance, which came a few hours later, confirmed that Yuuri was now awake, sipping some Coke and writing something in a bound notebook this time.
The third was more similar to the first– though during Yuuri’s struggle to get into a comfortable position, his plain white t-shirt rode up, revealing just a sliver of what was a monochromatic tattoo of a lily, resting comfortably on his hip. Victor’s mind jumped to a thousand different scenarios, before he brushed them away and continued writing.
Seven hours later, he found himself tapping out a rhythm in his head. He had all of the lyrics except one couplet and it was increasingly frustrating him.
i can’t tell
if you’re coming near
why isn’t anything i say
ever clear?
Victor death-gripped his pen. He was stuck. He had been stuck on this for the past hour. He ignored it, figuring out everything else– the tempo, the background harmonies, the instrumentals. It just needed this one line to finish it.
He was about to give up on it when he was startled by Yuuri’s voice.
“Could it be any more obvious? I love you, my dear,” Yuuri said softly.
Victor hit his head on the tray table. “ What? ”
Yuuri flushed a light pink. “That can be the last couplet. The one that you need. It’s being direct after you were hinting at it in the last few lines.”
There was a slight pause as Victor stared at him incredulously.
“I'm sorry, I shouldn't have– it was none of my business.”
This pulled Victor out of his stupor. “No– no, thank you.” He laughed airily, giddy with relief.
He wrote down the lines sloppily, thanking Yuuri profusely.
“Do you write music yourself?” Victor asked, after a long pause and a swig of Coke. “I noticed you were writing something when I sat down."
The tips of Yuuri’s ears turned pink as he answered. “Just a little bit.”
“I’m sure you’re really good,” Victor said with a smile.
They lapsed into silence once more, but not because of the inherent awkwardness of meeting someone new but one of comfort and something deeper that Victor couldn’t quite point out.
When the flight finally landed, Victor slipped out of his seat, rushed, having almost immediately gotten a call from Yakov as soon as he turned his cellular data back on.
By the time Victor had finished speaking to his producer, he had exited the plane, on the lookout for his driver. Any thoughts of a certain Yuuri had evaded his mind, just slipping past the threshold of conscious thought.
That is, until he had already settled himself into the back of the car. Victor shoved his face into his hands and groaned. He hadn’t even gotten the chance to say goodbye. A flash of Yuuri’s tattoo flashed in his head for a second, lingering as Victor cursed himself for being an idiot.
“Are you alright, sir?” His driver asked him, brows furrowed slightly in concern.
“Yes…” Victor muttered softly. “I'm fine. Please go ahead and drive.”
All thoughts of Yuuri slowly evaporated as Victor's excitement rose exponentially. He was going to see Lilith, at last.