Yuri Plisetsky sat in the kiss and cry between Yakov and Lilia, hunched over and desperately trying to hide his face from the world. His knees ached from his drop to the ice. He would have regretted it if he didn't know it was unavoidable. Every last ounce of energy, every piece of his heart and soul had been in his free skate, and when it was over he was drained, unable to stand or hold back the tears.
Even now, the kiss and cry was living up to half of its name. Yuri couldn't stop the tears, though he was no longer beset by wracking sobs. The fall replayed over and over in his head. This was his chance, his chance at the gold, his chance to keep Yuuri Katsuki on the ice. If that one fall ruined it the way one fall had ruined Katsuki's short program, he didn't think he could take it.
The wait was agonizing. It seemed like they were taking hours working out his score. Memories flooded Yuri's mind. He was watching last year's free skate again, Katsuki's step sequence carving out a permanent place in his heart. He was following Yuuri through the halls, trying to think of a way to approach him. He was taking a deep breath and charging into the bathroom, waiting for his chance to speak with Yuuri alone, when he heard the rushed japanese conversation stop and the sobbing start. He was choking down sympathy tears, channeling them into rage as he had taught himself so long ago, and berating the boy - no, the man, Yuri thought as he remembered the way his heart sank when he realized how much older Katsuki was - who had so captivated him for looking so weak.
Then there was the banquet, and the way his heart beat when a very, very drunk Katsuki challenged him to a dance-off. It was a ridiculous request, a bizarre response to Yuri's verbal beat-down, but he was elated to see the other man's footwork again, to compete with him in some way, to impress him. He was glad he had the swiss perv use his phone to take pictures, because now he had them forever. Once the stripping portion of the evening started (of course the perv had a collapsible pole), he fought Yakov tooth and nail to stay and take pictures ("It's for blackmail" was the excuse) even as the other junior competitors were rushed out. He couldn't stop staring at Katsuki, the things he could do with his body even more alluring than his step sequences. From there the evening was less and less of a happy memory. The image of Yuuri grinding into Viktor, moaning for him to drop everything and coach him, of their stupid tango, of the way Yuri just faded into the background once Viktor joined in all haunted him.
Viktor's pining over the next few months was intolerable. "Why won't that Japanese skater call me? Celestino won't return my calls. Chris doesn't know how to contact him. Does anyone know him?" Yuri pretended not to hear even as he was checking Katsuki's rankings every day. He read article after article about how Katsuki was injured or something and bombed at nationals, after which he completely vanished from social media.
But the damn video. When the google alert popped up, he dropped everything to watch it despite Yakov's bitching. "What an idiot," he mumbled. As if skating Viktor's stupid program was worth a damn. He still couldn't look away from the step sequence though, and hell, even his jumps were perfect. It was exactly what Yuri had wanted to see at the GPF. When he heard from Yakov the next day that Viktor had run off to Japan, he thought his heart might explode. Not only was he making good on Katsuki's drunken offer, but he still hadn't choreographed Yuri's program like he promised. Viktor was useless. His Instagram was suspiciously quiet for a week until he finally showed his location: Hasetsu, Kyushu, Japan. The plane ticket was worth every goddamn penny.
Hasetsu turned out to be quite charming. Their cat-related fashion game was on point, anyway. He finally tracked Viktor down only to have Katsuki run right past him, like he didn't even exist, babbling about Viktor in this pathetic starstruck tone. Yuri felt himself shaking with emotion and once again channeled it into blind fury. His attempts at belittling Yuuri were met with an insufferable smirk, which only made things worse. As the two of them watched Viktor skate, he tried to warn Katsuki in his own way about the older man's flightiness. When it didn't seem to take he went back to bellowing for Viktor.
Eros and Agape. Exactly the kind of bullshit he expected from Viktor. Yuri latched on to Eros anyway, hoping to draw out the Yuuri Katsuki he had seen at the start of the stupid banquet. He didn't expect Viktor to have the exact same plan. Now he was stuck playing the lovestruck teen with Agape like the kind of loser he hated...though maybe it wasn't all that off base after all.
Katsuki's inn was amazing. He couldn't fathom how Yuuri lived like this every day, with that incredible cutlet bowl and the hot springs and...well, everything about Hasetsu. Except maybe Yuuri's mouthy sister and her stupid nickname. Another notch carved into his heart by Yuuri Katsuki, and he didn't even know it. Every night, as he tossed and turned listening to Viktor snore and mumble in his sleep in the next room, he dreamed he was curling up behind Yuuri instead. He hated it. Not the dreams, but the vulnerability. Every time he saw Viktor blatantly, openly seducing Yuuri under the pretense of some lesson about eros, Yuri yelled, kicked, and screamed their attention away. He knew onsen on ice was the only way to separate them.
Oh, and the stupid waterfall. Half the reason he finally understood Agape, and it had fuck all to do with whatever Viktor was thinking. He finally realized agape wasn't inherently romantic, and the only true love Yuri had ever known was his grandfather's. Still, when Yuuri grabbed his hand and looked at him with concern, followed by intrigue, Yuri could feel his heart pounding again. He stared at the taller boy - man - for a moment, wet, nigh-transparent clothes clinging to his body, then turned away and sneezed. It was pitiful, surely. But he didn't take his hand away.
Then Yuuri asked for his help with the salchow. Part of him hated the idea of helping a competitor. Part of him wanted the competition to be as serious as possible. Part of him still wanted to see Yuuri skate flawlessly, and part of him was completely overwhelmed with affection. He wasn't sure which part won in the end, exactly. The salchow was Yuri's best quad, but even he didn't land it all the time. He never missed it once in front of Yuuri Katsuki.
The night before the skate off was their last night together. Viktor decided they should play with some stupid sparklers. Yuri hated the sound they made, but in the end enjoyed their beauty, the way they left a trail when he danced on Hasetsu's lovely shores. Still, he mostly just watched Yuuri. He was so graceful when he was skating or dancing, nothing like the clumsy (lovable) loser he usually was. Lit only by the sparklers, glasses tucked away for safekeeping, Yuuri looked so beautiful it hurt.
It hurt a lot, in fact, though not as badly as the onsen on ice. Agape completely deserted him as he focused too much on the win than on his love. Not surprising, given that he himself was still actively fighting the entire idea of love. Still, once Yuuri was on the ice, his worries were gone. Gone from the moment the Yuuri Katsuki, awkward loser vanished and was replaced by Katsuki Yuuri, master seductress instead. Even Viktor's fucking wolf whistle couldn't ruin it for him, nor could the flubbed salchow. He knew Yuuri had it in him to do it, and even without it his PCS was sure to be incredible. That was when it dawned on him that he lost, and the spell of eros ended. Yuri dropped his head and slipped out of the ice castle, utterly defeated. Yuko, mothering instincts apparently in high gear, found him outside. Her comfort was enough to keep Yuri from crying, but only just.
Yuri forced Katsuki's eros out of his mind until the day the assignments came out. They would be competing again in Moscow. It was almost more than he could have hoped for (though the fact that he had two events with that idiot JJ and only one with Yuuri seemed like a cruel joke). He tried to ignore Yuuri's existence over the next few months, but then there was the stupid picture that almost broke his phone, and the stupid kiss that almost shattered his world. That night, his cat plushes ended up scattered around the room in a hurricane of rage and jealousy.
Before the kiss, though, the cup of China was worth every second. He was so utterly captivatd by Eros, he didn't even realize he had been sucking air through a straw for two minutes. Thank god Mila didn't see. For once, when Georgi skated out his heartbreak, Yuri finally understood his histrionics. Then the free skate came...and with it, a near-perfect quadruple flip. At the end of a program. Not just any program, but a long program. Yuri felt his heart pounding in a way now familiar to him. He thought his eyes seemed wet for a moment. If this was the Yuuri Katsuki he would be skating against soon, then it was going to be even more than he dreamed. But then there was the kiss, his shirt getting splattered with borscht, and last of all a fitful night's sleep.
Back in reality, his score was finally in. 199 something. The tears flowed faster as he realized it may not be enough. The wait for the final rankings, though shorter than the wait for his score, seemed even longer given its significance.
In Moscow, the kiss was still fresh on his mind, as though it happened yesterday. He knew he was rougher with Katsuki than he should have been, more than he wanted to, but he didn't care. Stupid pig. Viktor's affection was meaningless, anyway. He didn't watch most of Eros that day, knowing it would be the end of him. On top of that, his grandfather was sick again and wouldn't make it. Agape was fucked.
Despite that, Yuri's shaken confidence was briefly bolstered by Yuuri's success...until that idiot Viktor kissed his fucking skate. The jealousy bubbled into rage and boiled into fury. They even has the gall to trade languages when they wised him luck like dorks. It was a weird thing to get hung up on, but Yuri didn't care. The blind fury consumed every drop of love he had in him, leading to his poorest Agape yet. He fumed through the entirety of JJ's narcissistic bullshit skate, too dejected to be annoyed. Viktor left that night, and Yuri relished being able to briefly train with the object of his hate-filled affections again.
The free skate almost killed him. He gasped and choked on the ice, barely able to breathe. It took everything he had not to wretch, and he wondered if Yakov would have to come drag him off the ice. His legs eventually worked again and he dragged himself to the kiss and cry. At the very least, his gamble paid off. He turned to celebrate with Katsudon, but saw him already on the ice, looking like a goddamn tragedy. Was he really going to bomb without Viktor here to prop him up? Yuri made an attempt at being supportive, only to have Lilia and JJ shit all over it. He allowed himself to be dragged away, not wanting to see how dependent Yuuri was on Viktor. Still, when the scores came in, it was obvious. Yuuri should have at least gotten bronze, if not outright beaten him. After successfully fleeing Yuuri's bizarre hug-filled celebration, he grabbed the katsudon piroshki and ran out of the locker room to track Katsuki down.
It took ages of running through Moscow snow, but he found Yuuri looking morose outside. Was he still fucking broken up about Viktor? Yuri found himself kicking Katsuki again, despite the peace offering he held. He lectured Yuuri in the nicest way he could, then tossed the bag of piroshki at him. "Eat," he commanded when Yuuri failed to get the point. When Yuuri's face lit up, he felt his heart soar to unknown heights, the widest, brightest smile he'd ever made lighting up his face. Every heartbeat seemed to patch up the aches and pains of the last year as he watched Yuuri happily munch away at the piroshki, that beautiful combination of both of their favorite foods. Yuri had never loved his grandpa more than he did at that very moment.
Still, patchwork was patchwork. Even reconnecting with Otabek and making his first real friend wasn't enough to prepare him for the night before the GPF. Still, talking with the hero of Kazakhstan was deeply cathartic. Otabek noted that Yuri had been talking about Katsuki the entire night, and his face burned at the observation. It was almost a relief to be hauled off by Yuri and Viktor to escape Otabek's knowing smile. Discovering that Yuuri didn't recall the banquet was a mixed blessing - on the one hand, it meant he didn't completely disregard the fun they had together, but on the other, it meant the photos he had clung to for a year meant less than nothing to Yuuri. He brushed off the night as though it was nothing, a humiliation; as though it wasn't the only time he'd enjoyed socializing in...ever. What was humiliating was Chris noticing the rings. He was choking on rage and misery again, just like he had at the banquet.
Those stupid. Fucking. Rings.
It was bad enough that Viktor proclaimed their goddamn engagement to the world, worse still that it supposedly hinged on Katsuki's victory. For once, Yuri was grateful for JJ when he disrupted the evening. It allowed him to process the night. When he was in bed, listening to Yakov's snoring through the walls, his defense mechanism broke down. Being with Katsuki was a longshot to begin with, but with a marriage looming, it was impossible. He couldn't channel that sadness into rage anymore, and he cried himself to sleep.
He spotted Viktor on the pier the next morning from his window. The rage came flooding back. Karsuki didn't know what kind of asshole Viktor was, how fickle his heart could be. He dressed in a hurry and stormed out to confront Viktor with a flurry of kicks. Insults spewed out of his mouth unbidden, uncontrolled, targeting Viktor and Yuuri alike. It wasn't until Viktor's hand was squeezing his face, shaking violently, that it dawned on him. Viktor loved Yuuri. It wasn't a passing fancy. The rings were real. The kiss was real. Everything was real and everything hurt. Free from Viktor, he looked out over the beach, remembering a night of sparklers and starlight. An inadvertent peace offering was made and accepted as Yuri conceded defeat. He finally accepted that he loved Yuuri, that he probably always would, but that it was time to let him go.
The next day, he skated Agape perfectly. Beyond perfectly. He couldn't even remember it. All he remembered was flashes of his grandpa, of Yuuri, of the love he saw in Viktor's usually passionless eyes, even the people of Hasetsu who cared for him despite barely knowing him. When he closed his eyes and tried to remember, all he could feel was love washing over him and a lump rising in his throat. Dimly, he was aware of how much of a cocky shit he was that day. He'd earned it though.
Viktor and Yuuri barely spoke the next day, he noticed. At least until it was Yuuri's turn to skate (after that disgusting idiot JJ's disgusting idiot comeback). Their tender conversation, the hand holding, the ghost of another kiss. Yuri felt his heart ache again and quietly willed it away. He wanted Yuuri to be happy. As he watched Yuuri's free skate, he realized that Katsuki had certainly achieved happiness. It wasn't just Viktor, either; Yuuri had finally learned to love himself the way Viktor did. Hell, the way Yuri himself did. It was the most beautiful thing Yuri had seen in his short life.
After such a divine performance, surely he was going to be the one to beat. Yuri was already looking forward to Worlds, to the next GPF, with Katsuki across the ice from him. At least until Viktor, seeming just as heavy hearted as before, came running up to Yakov talking about coming back to skating. Viktor refused to give an answer when Yuri demanded to know what that meant for Katsuki's career, but Viktor's sudden affection and the damp spot on his shoulder said all he needed to know. That was exactly why he had poured so much of himself into that free skate. It was more than just his intense desire to win. He wanted Yuuri on the ice forever, and he would get it even if he really did keel over at the end of the performance this time.
He didn't die, but he did win. That .12 was the most beautiful number in the world to him. It was his senior debut, at 15 no less, and he had won.
Finally coming back to the world, locked in a hug with his coach and choreographer. Yuri noticed Katsuki in the stands, looking up at the scores in awe. Finally, a moment alone with him. He ran up the steps, blowing right past his team and the press.
"Oi, Katsudon," Yuri shouted. Yuuri turned around, still looking shell shocked, but smiled warmly at the sight of Yuri. It made his stupid heart melt.
"Congratulations, Yurio," he said. He seemed sincere. Like he always did.
Yuri didn't even care about the nickname anymore. "Shut up," he mumbled. "What's this bullshit I hear about retiring? You don't have your gold yet. And if you leave I'll beat your stupid, shitty record, too."
Yuuri kept smiling. It wasn't forced or anything, nor was the genuine affection in those beautiful brown eyes. "Can't retire 'til I get at least one gold," he said casually. "And I know you'll beat my record. Even if I set another one, I know you'll take that too. Long after I'm gone you'll keep breaking them. You're truly amazing, Yurio."
It was too much. Yuri felt his heart break, re-fuse, and break all over again. He threw himself at Yuuri, burying his face in the taller skater's chest and sobbing again, not even caring that the stupid glitter on Katsuki's shirt was going to be all over his face. Yuuri held him close, confused but concerned, and that just made the tears fall faster. He hated it, and he hated himself for letting this happen. His arms remained wrapped around Yuuri, tiny fists flailing against the broad, strong back as he fought against the emotions. Yuuri gave a nervous laugh and let the younger boy go about his business. He was no stranger to coping mechanisms.
"You're probably gonna leave a mark there, Yurio," he teased.
"Shut up, katsudon," Yuri mumbled into his chest. He felt words crawling up his throat, leaping unbidden from his mouth, "I hope you never retire."
He heard Yuuri's breath catch in his throat, felt his heart, pressed against Yuri's cheek, skip a beat and then double in speed. "W-what did you say, Yurio?"
"You heard me," Yuri growled, holding him more and more tightly. At this point he was doing it to keep the flush on his cheeks hidden. "I'm not saying it again."
"I guess I was just surprised to hear that from someone who screamed the exact opposite at me in a toilet stall," Yuuri said through a nervous smile.
"Yeah, well, I guess I didn't mean it," Yuri confessed, having to force every syllable through the wall he himself had built up. "I was just...upset."
"Why were you upset? You won. I was the one who-"
"Don't," Yuri said bitterly, pushing himself out of the embrace. "I don't give a damn that you messed up your jumps and I care even less about your excuses. You were still amazing," He wasn't sure where these words were coming from. Maybe it was dehydration from all the crying. He stood there in silence for a moment, not making eye contact with Yuuri.
"Thank you, Yurio," Yuuri finally answered. "Thank you for that, and for helping me land the salchow, and for challenging me every step of the way."
"You too," Yuri choked out. "Thanks, I mean. And I just wanna say that I...I...well, hopefully you know."
"I...really don't, actually," came the stunned reply.
"Figure it out then, katsudon," Yuri snapped. He hoped he sounded less weak than he felt.
The silence as Yuuri struggled for words was too much. So was the vulnerability Yuri still felt tugging at his heart. He left the bewildered skater behind and made his way to the ice for the medal ceremony. He stood on the podium unwilling or unable to smile, he wasn't sure which. He refused to look at Yuuri. The medal hanging around his neck was once all he ever wanted, but it felt like dead weight.