(A/n) Paris would like to immediately address the fact that this story existed before they watched Yuri on Ice or knew it existed, so it's really not based on that anime at all. (It admittedly helped out later on with some more of the terminology. But still.)
This story was a request from SuperLeaf, who asked for some fluffy CanAme. We kind of took it and ran with it. XD We estimate it will be either a two-shot or a three-shot.
Keep in mind that neither of us are hockey players or figure skaters, but we did our research and tried to be as accurate as possible. We apologise if we made a mistake somewhere. Feel free to let us know if you catch something.
They'd won.
It hadn't been by much, but dammit, they'd won, and that was all that mattered.
Exhaling into the frosty air of the rink, Alfred skidded to a stop, yanking off his helmet and pulling out his mouth guard. He was sore everywhere, and chilled and ready to fall over.
And he couldn't be happier.
The rush of zooming across the ice with the goal in sight... the goalie hadn't remotely stood a chance against his adrenaline.
The roar of the crowd very nearly deafened him, and he couldn't help laughing out loud. Who knew parents and teachers could make so much noise?
His overwhelming excitement was almost cut short as the blade on his left skate slipped, nearly sending him face first onto the ice.
Luckily, he caught his balance, and decided it was time to head to the locker room, lest he maim himself.
He loved hockey.
From nearby, the team's newest member, Matthew, trailed after Alfred into the locker room, where he quickly found a seat and unlaced his skates. He watched the other team members congratulate Alfred on a great game with a twinge of envy.
The Canadian had transferred to the school a few short months ago. He went from being the captain of an undefeated team to being an unrecognizable newbie of an adequate team, but he didn't mind all that much.
As soon as the others left the arena, Matthew's fun could really start.
Catching sight of Matthew, Alfred offered him a friendly wave. "Hey- Matt, right? Me and the guys are going down to Cold Stone to celebrate. Wanna join us?"
"No, thank you," Matthew smiled politely. "I've got plans, but thank you anyway, Alfred."
"You're the kinda guy who's got plans at nine on a school night, huh?" Alfred joked. "Whatever. Maybe next time?"
"Yeah, maybe next time," Matthew agreed.
He just wanted the rest of them to clear out so he could enjoy his plans.
Shrugging, Alfred shouldered his bag. "Okay, then. See you Monday."
Finally, everyone filed out of the arena, leaving Matthew to his craft. He quickly stripped his hockey gear until he was in his leggings and tee shirt.
He took his personal skates out of his bag and he laced them up before sliding back onto the ice. He connected his phone to the Bluetooth speakers, turned on his music, and started skating.
Matthew grinned as he leapt into the air, the music filling his head and taking over his muscles. All the little aches and pains from the hockey game disappeared, leaving him with the happiness and the familiarity of the sound of skates clicking on the ice.
He was finally in his element. Figure skating was his secret vice, and he was never happier than he was when he was spinning and gliding on the ice.
Just outside the rink, Alfred paused. If he listened hard enough, he thought he could hear music filtering under the door. Narrowing his eyes, he dropped his bag.
"Hey, it sounds like some loitering kid is messing with the sound system again. I'll be right back, guys."
With a few impatient nods from his friends, he hastily re-entered the rink, hoping to quickly put a stop to the problem and get going. He only got a few nights off, and he didn't plan to waste this one on poorly raised children with too much time on their greasy little hands.
"All right, kids," Alfred began, putting on his best authority tone as he made his way between the seats. "This place is closed, so you-"
He froze at the railing, slapping a hand over his mouth. Was that Matthew down there...?
The Canadian was unable to hear him over the rush of adrenaline as he performed a spread eagle before landing into a flying sit spin, a favorite trick of his.
Alfred's mouth fell open. He was completely mesmerized. What was Matthew doing? Dancing on skates?
Matthew continued the routine until the song ended, breaking him from his trance with flushed cheeks and heavy breath.
When he saw that someone was watching him, and Alfred at that, his face lost all color and his feet lost his balance. After falling rather painfully on his ass, he flung his voice again. "W-what are you doing here, eh?"
"Oh!" Alfred gasped, realising he'd been seen. "I, ah... well, I heard music... and that usually means there are ten year olds vandalizing the sound system. Didn't mean to interrupt your... dance skating."
"Figure skating, and I'm going home now," Matthew called as he clumsily scrambled to his feet, cheeks burning.
"Oh, uh..." Alfred chewed his lip, rubbing the back of his neck. He recognised the term "figure skating" now, remembering how his parents would watch such a sport during the Olympics. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable, man... honest, I didn't even know what you were doing."
"That's okay, but I'm still leaving." Matthew disconnected from the Bluetooth and hurried back into the locker room, not wanting to talk about this anymore.
"Hey, wait!" Alfred followed him quickly, sliding across the ice in his worn black converse. He sprinted into the locker room. "Matthew, hold on!"
Matthew harshly unlaced his skates, not caring that his fingers were numb. "What is it, Alfred?"
"I'm sorry, okay?" he attempted. "I didn't mean to stare. But you're really good."
"Hardly," Matthew muttered, yanking his skates off. "I'm nothing special."
"Dude, that was amazing, though!" Alfred gushed, unable to control himself. "How long did it take you to learn all that?"
"I've been skating since I was five and figure skating since I was seven. The actual routine took about six months," Matthew sighed, shoving his things into his bag.
"Is it hard?" Alfred trailed into the locker room. "Like, harder than hockey."
"Harder, yes. More fun, also yes. Excuse me." Matthew shouldered his bag and hurried out of the room.
Alfred sighed, before turning back around and following him.
The Canadian continued outside, pulling his phone out and texting his papa for a ride home.
"Matthew, hang on," Alfred begged, sprinting past his friends and skidding up beside him. "I'm sorry for not saying anything..."
"I accept your apology. Why are you still following me?" Matthew snapped softly, not facing him.
"Because I had to get out of the rink too?" He put on his winning smile. "So! Will you teach me?"
"What?" Matthew crossed his arms as he finally turned to look at him. "No."
"Why not?" Alfred inquired, still smiling brightly.
"Because figure skating is hard. It's not like hockey, it's powerful and passionate and beautiful, and I can't teach that to you," Matthew explained coldly.
"Well, you had to learn it from somewhere," Alfred pointed out. "And besides, you could just give me the basics. I'm a pretty good skater. I'm flexible, too."
"If I were to hypothetically give you lessons, what would I hypothetically get from it?" the Canadian asked, raising an eyebrow.
"What? Do you want me to pay you or something?" Alfred shrugged. "I'm kinda broke at the moment... but I do have a job."
"I'm not giving you lessons for free, especially when I have no reason to assume you have natural talent. Where do you work?"
Alfred paused. "I'll tell you, but you've gotta promise not to laugh."
"I won't," Matthew assured, although he wasn't sure if he was refusing to promise or refusing to laugh.
Alfred took it as the latter, and leaned in closer to Matthew, as if about to whisper some big government secret. "Olive Garden."
"Olive Garden," Matthew repeated, considering this. "Okay, I'll cut you a deal. I'll give you lessons on Tuesdays and Thursdays on the condition that you bring dinner, complete with breadsticks and salad or no deal."
Alfred blinked at him. "Seriously? All I have to do is bring you food?" He paused. "I'm guessing you don't plan on buying it, huh?"
"Nope. That's how you're paying for lessons," Matthew decided. "You should feel lucky. I could charge you two hundred dollars for a couple months of lessons instead."
"Hmph, now you're a salesperson," Alfred joked. "Okay. Deal. When do I start?"
"Next Tuesday, after this weekend," the Canadian nodded as his ride pulled up. "Five thirty to seven."
"Cool!" Alfred replied, seeming to bounce on his toes a little. "Hey, can I get your phone number? So you can tell me what you want to eat, and stuff."
Sighing, Matthew found a scrap of paper in his pocket and scribbled out his phone number before handing out to the American. "I have to go now. I'll see you Tuesday."
With that, he climbed into the passenger seat of his father's car.
Alfred waved. "See ya!"
It then occurred to him that he'd left his friends standing at the entrance for quite some time. Laughing to himself, he made his way back.
"What was that all about, Al?" one of his friends asked, raising an eyebrow.
Figuring Matthew wouldn't want him to spread it around (and also not anxious for his friends to know his hobby to be), Alfred brushed it off. "Oh, nothing. Now, are we going, or what?"
"Yeah, come on, let's get there before they close."
"And Ivan is buying!" Alfred teased, nudging his friend playfully as he led the way to the neighbourhood Cold Stone.
He felt oddly giddy, and he wasn't entirely sure why. But he wasn't complaining.
Matthew was back in his leggings and skates, sitting in the penalty box as he waited for the American to show up.
He wasn't left waiting very long. About ten minutes later, in came a panting Alfred, with his skates, a change of clothes, and a bag that smelt of garlic. "Matt? Where are you?"
"Penalty box," Matthew called. "Did you bring something tasty?"
"I hope you like rigatoni," Alfred replied, making his way over. "With breadsticks and salad, as promised."
"Mmmn, that sounds yummy," Matthew grinned. Now that he wasn't tired and embarrassed, he was in a much better mood. "Okay, so I suggest leaving the pasta for a bit later in the practice, since it's kind of heavy, and starting on the salad, but you know your body better than I do."
Alfred shrugged. "That's yours. I already ate."
Truthfully, he'd used the money for his own dinner to get Matthew's food, figuring he'd grab something when he got home. Though now that he considered it, skating on an empty stomach probably wouldn't be fun.
"This is plenty of food to share," Matthew insisted. "And skating will make you hungry again, so you can eat what you want."
"Mm..." Alfred pursed his lips, not wanting to look like a pig. "Er... maybe I'll just have a breadstick."
Matthew handed him the bag of breadsticks before starting on the salad. He was making a mental checklist of what Alfred needed to know in order to learn the better things.
Quicker than his hunger let him control, Alfred wolfed down a breadstick, before pausing to tilt his head at Matthew. "You're glaring at that salad."
"I'm just trying to think," Matthew explained, taking a bite of the salad. "What tricks do you know? Can you skate backwards? Spin? Jump?"
"Tricks?" Alfred's brow creased as he considered this. "I can do some backwards skating... and, er, spin accidentally?"
"Okay, we've got a long way to go," Matthew sighed. "We'll focus on backwards skating today, and then we'll do spinning on Thursday."
"Hey, ya didn't think I'd know everything, did you?" Alfred inquired with a grin. "I mean, if I could do all that fancy stuff, I wouldn't be coming to you for lessons and paying your wages in pasta."
"I know, it's just been a while since I've had lessons on those," Matthew admitted, setting the salad box down.
"Man, from what I saw, you're pretty freaking good at them anyway," Alfred reminded him.
"Knowing how to do something and how to explain something are two entirely different things," Matthew pointed out, getting to his feet. "Are you ready?"
Nodding, Alfred rose to his feet and brushed off the crumbs from the front of his shirt. "Yep!"
Matthew skilfully skated to the center of the rink. "First thing first. Before we could even think about going backwards, I need to see if you can get rid of the hockey stance. See how my knees aren't bent?"
Alfred observed Matthew's stance and posture, and tried to copy it. He scrunched his nose. "This feels weird."
"Well yeah, but you can't skate all crouched down. It's gonna feel weird, since you're working a whole different set of muscles, but hey," Matthew winked, feeling much more confident on the ice. "That's how you get an ass like mine."
Alfred sneezed, not having expected that from the seemingly shy kid in front of him. "Wha...?"
Not that he was disagreeing. Matthew did have quite the nice ass.
"Now, listen up. Let's do a few laps like this, keep your posture right, and then we can move along."
With that, Matthew took off, skating quickly off to the edge of the rink.
Trying his best to keep the unfamiliar stance, Alfred moved off after Matthew. He felt like a beginner at ice skating again: off balance, unsure, and ready to hug the wall.
Matthew surged along, making sure to exaggerate his movements so Alfred could see the proper technique. "Move with your hips!"
"I feel like Shakira!" Alfred whined, but attempted to do as Matthew instructed. "Like this?"
"Closer, but straighten your knees a bit more," Matthew called. "You're going back to hockey stance."
Scrunching up his brow in concentration, Alfred straightened his legs again. "It's so weird to skate in anything other than hockey stance."
"I know, and it'll leave you sore after a while, too, but it's actually easier once you've got the hang of it," Matthew explained, doing a quick jump before continuing on his lap- only this time, he was facing backwards to examine Alfred's form.
Alfred blinked, quirking an eyebrow. "Am I s'pposed to do that too?"
"Nope, I'm just watching you," Matthew assured with a laugh. He was a bit of an accidental show-off, and being on the ice gave him a lot of confidence.
"Oh." Grinning, he struck a pose. "How do I look?"
Suddenly caught off-balance, he then proceeded to fall on his ass.
"You look like a dork," Matthew giggled, stopping his journey. He skated close to Alfred. "Need a hand?"
"Awh, hell, Matt, let me have my pride," Alfred replied with a winning smile. Trying to sit up, his hand slipped on the ice again, and with a glorious flail, he was back down. He grinned sheepishly at Matthew. "Please."
Laughing good-naturedly, Matthew extended a hand down to the American. "It's like learning to skate all over again, eh?"
Red-faced, Alfred took the offered hand. "You can say that again. I haven't fallen that bad since I first started out."
"It takes practice, that's all," Matthew assured, carefully pulling Alfred back onto his feet. "Don't worry, though. Once you get the basics down, you rarely fall."
"Yeah, that's what they told me when I started hockey," Alfred snickered. "I didn't believe them, either."
"You should know by now that they were right," Matthew pointed out, hands on hips.
"I like to think my unbelievable, overflowing skill kept me from falling."
"Right, right," Matthew snorted. "That's exactly it."
Alfred crossed his arms, quirking an eyebrow. "You know, for whatever reason, I feel like you don't believe me."
"Your 'unbelievable, overflowing skill' just had you fall on your ass doing forward skating," Matthew pointed out, skating away from him backwards. "I think we've got a long way to go."
"Hey, my skill has to test me sometimes!" Alfred quickly skated after him (forward, thanks very much.)
"I don't think that's how it works," Matthew laughed. "You're bending your knees again."
Alfred stuck out his tongue, trying to straighten his knees again. "Don't you tell me how my skill works."
"I can do what I want," Matthew grinned, doing a quick single toe loop for fun.
"What, like show off?" Alfred was grinning, despite his words. The spins and jumps were quite pleasant to watch.
"Exactly. That's why I'm the teacher."
"Okay, fine, Professor Show-Off," Alfred teased. "What now?"
"Now you turn yourself around and try to skate backwards," Matthew decided.
"I'm gonna take a wild guess and say you mean Shakira backwards and not hockey backwards."
"Eh, close enough," Matthew grinned, resting against the wall so he could observe Alfred's attempts.
Alfred knew well enough how to turn around quickly on the ice. He'd learnt this solidly enough in the years he'd been playing hockey.
However, turning gracefully was a different story altogether.
He'd seen how balanced and pretty Matthew's turns were, and his pride- or something- suddenly wouldn't let him simply turn as he knew how.
He could do it.
Brow furrowing in concentration, he tried to mimic what Matthew had done.
This made way for the next major backfire. Not only did he fall, but he ended up in a full split on the ice.
"Are you okay?" Matthew called, hurriedly skating over to him.
Alfred raised his head, and it was clear only his pride had been injured. He remained in the split like he hardly noticed. "Yep."
"Can you get up on your own or would you like help?" Matthew asked, biting back giggles.
"Hey, no need to stomp all over my pride and spit on it." Alfred pushed himself back to his feet, managing to keep steady on the blades. "Kicking it over was plenty."
"Okay, sheesh, just trying to help. Now try again, and maybe try a spin you're familiar with?" Matthew suggested.
"So like… protect-the-goal spin." Alfred demonstrated the far from graceful turn.
"As long as it gets you backwards momentum, go for it," Matthew advised, nodding.
"Okay, sure." Alfred began moving himself backwards. "Now what?"
"Now keep moving backwards," Matthew informed him, beginning to skate backwards as well. "Do the things you would do to skate normally, but in reverse."
"Right." Focusing on straightening his legs, Alfred actually managed to gain excellent momentum.
It carried him straight into the wall.
Laughing, Matthew once again skated up to him. "Maybe we should take a break? You learned quite a bit today."
"Yeah, like how to fall." Alfred picked himself gingerly up off the ice once more. "I don't think I've knocked myself over this much since I was two."
"That's why there isn't a time limit for these lessons," Matthew informed him. "I say let's call it a day, and we can learn some more stuff on Thursday and work you up to the harder stuff."
"What? Like the shit they do on TV?" Alfred grinned. "I can't even tell the difference between some of those jumps and they all have names. And numbers, too, apparently."
"Again, that's what these lessons are for. Come on, let's finish that pasta."
Alfred let himself snort in amusement. "Olive Garden for athletes. At least you guys skate alone. I bet my breath will be great. The other team's goalie can't stand garlic. Maybe these lessons are helpful in more ways than one…"