how they howl (the winds of change)
"The sun hid her face
in the clouds.
She didn't want the world
to see her cry.
Her teardrops burned holes
in the horizon,
she lost her desire to shine."
- Christy Ann Martine
From the set of his former wife's brows, Yakov Feltsman knows somebody, somewhere, is about to weep.
It's not so different from her usual expression that a stranger may take notice – but he's loved her long enough that he can read her like an open book, world-weary and torn-paged as she is.
Over the years, Yakov has seen her throat arched in passion, her cheeks creased in smiles, her lips pulled down in sorrow. And this surprises people, when he deigns to tell them, how deeply his once-wife feels, like every hurt is an arrow in her heart, every laugh an unexpected gift.
But from her stunted variety of facial expressions, this is the one that scares Yakov the most (even when they shared a name and a home, this scared him, though he will never admit – still, he suspects she already knows).
Lilia is in his office, seated while he stands, and the slight twitch in her elegantly arched eyebrow marks her as a woman scorned - which is unusual, Yakov muses, for a woman so used to doing the scorning.
"Sit down, Yakov." Lilia leisurely flicks her hand towards the chair –the one in front of his desk, the infuriating woman- as if this is her office and he the intruder. "Don't loom over me so."
Yakov feels tempted to refuse her, if only to spite, but he is too curious what brought her out of her studio's golden-tinted gates, so he complies; a little begrudgingly, perhaps, but Lilia pretends not to notice and Yakov pretends not to care).
"What's brought you here, Lilia?" His voice is intentionally harsh, but her name comes out as a caress anyway. "We're very busy, as you well know."
Lilia purses her lips and raises her other brow, as if to ask "Are you really?", and Yakov already tastes arguments on the tip of his tongue, but she speaks before he has any chance to retaliate to the thinly-veiled offence.
"This coming season, I want Yuri to work with a composer for his programs' music."
Yakov is both skeptic and annoyed (and this is not because his former wife had the audacity to barge into his office and demand perhaps the only thing that might increase his already obscenely high rate of falling hair, not at all).
"Since when are you so interested in Yuri?"
"I'm not interested in him, Yakov; only his career." Lilia is lying, and they both know it, but their lies are steps in an endless dance of wills. "I'm still holding hope that he will come to his senses while he's still young, and dance in the ballet" (that is only wishful thinking, because there is a joy in his ice skating that is utterly absent in his dancing, but she contends in needling Yakov, and this was too good an opportunity) "but until then, I do want him to achieve his goals."
Yakov is somewhat mollified, because a determined Lilia is no cause for concern if they are allies, rather than opponents. But suddenly he remembers that they had never been allies, not really, only enemies caught in a lover's truce, and his insides twist in apprehension.
"And who's the composer you have in mind?" He's sure this is not a question out of the blue – she already knows how everything will unravel (Yakov wonders, sometimes, if it's a woman-thing, this prescience, or if it's simply Lilia – he doesn't know which terrifies him most).
"Zoya Romanova."
Lilia's tone is expectative, and Yakov does not disappoint: his nostrils flare and his eyes widen and his bushy eyebrows climb up his wrinkles, like caterpillars reaching wishfully for wings. He already laments the loss of his sanity, because his ex-wife always has her way, and while Zoya and Yuri are, separately, unmanageable at best, Yakov doesn't think Russia – the entirety of Europe, even- stands a chance against their combined, sheer essence of brat.
Sometimes –like now- he doesn't know whether Lilia is awe-inspiringly brilliant, or tongue-tyingly terrifying.
(Either way, he's tempted to weep, himself.)
Yuri always knows when something weighs heavily on Yakov's mind – his coach is not as subtle in his mannerism as he'd like them all to believe. He yells less, for one thing, and tends to trail off in the middle of a sentence; he is blind and deaf to everything but the most obvious of disasters.
The signs are all there, waiting for someone to pick them up. Yuri is the only one who does – if not, he's the only one who cares. (How can he not? Yakov has the same awkward countenance when he tells Yuri that his grandpa can't make it to his competitions, that no, sorry, he can't go home to Moscow, not now, not yet, with the season in full swing.)
So Yuri stops and quietly contemplates how founded his worries are – a bit too quietly, if the strange stares his rink-mates send his way are to be believed. To cover it up, he calls Mila "baba" and makes gagging noises when he passes Viktor and Yuuri by and executes a quad Salcow (flawless, of course; not his favourite, but flashier than the triple Axel he hold close to his heart).
But this only helps so much – by the time practice ends, Yuri is restless, almost jumping out of his skin. He probably has no reasons to worry, but he can't help it; his grandpa is the only person he genuinely loves, and while he acknowledges that his skin is thick and that most things crumble into ashes in the face of his determination, Yuri knows he can't protect his heart. Nikolai's hurts are his' both by birthright and by choice.
Yuri is already planning to hang back and kick the answers right out of his coach, ballerina-style, in the way he knows Yakov hates, when Yakov gestures him closer. Yuri hastily glades towards him, his blades leaving ice specks trailing in his wake, his heart drumming a crazy staccato in his ears.
"What do you want?" Yuri is rude, but so is Yakov, which suits them both just fine. (Their shouting matches never fail to alarm casual bystanders, though.)
"Yuri…" he begins and falters, and a thousand scenarios fitter through Yuri's head, like doves caught mid-flight in a tornado. "How do you feel about working with a composer for next season?"
Relief washes over Yuri as his worries are laid to unceremonious rest, buried deep in his conscious to be remembered come night. But then he realizes he stressed out for almost nothing (or nothing in comparison to his darkest fears), and he feels like yelling. So he does, because he is Yuri Plisetsky, ice-skating prodigy extraordinaire, and he can get away with it.
"Are you out of your goddamned mind? I can't work with a composer!"
"Oh?" Yakov's eyebrows rise in challenge. "And why is that? Because it would require actual human contact?"
"Ha bloody ha. You're an even worse comedian than you are coach, so why not quit both?"
"And then who would put up with you?" They're both glaring, eyes shooting off pinpricks of lightning, turquoise on blue, blue on turquoise.
"Your ex-wife, for one." Yuri expects Yakov to flinch (doesn't even imagine that he wouldn't), but his coach merely grimaces, a strange glint spinning in his eyes, like a coin that's about to drop.
"Ah, yes. You might be right about that." The coin drops, and Yakov spins around and leisurely walks towards the nearest exit.
"W-wait, you old geezer! Why did you ask me this?" Yuri doesn't like it when other people storm off in the middle of a fight – that's his signature move as much as the Quad Flip is Viktor's, and Yakov, more than anyone, knows that, dammit.
The older man doesn't even break his long-legged stride.
"Ask Lilia, when you see her."
Yuri growls low in his throat, and fancies himself as terrifying as his moniker ("Ice Tiger of Russia" is the only one he likes). With narrowed eyes, he stomps off the ice, puts on his skate guards and makes for the locker room.
There's a strange tightness in his chest, a certain foreboding feeling that envelops him like a threadbare blanket. There was something in Yakov's voice, something he can't pinpoint that nags him… Yuri shudders, but he can't quite shake off the sensation.
When Yuuri Katsuki -already showered and dressed- sees his blonde namesake approaching, he smiles easily and asks if he wants to join him and Viktor for an early dinner. Yuri scoffs and doesn't answer, his shoulder hitting Yuuri's as he passes him. Or that is his intention, Yuuri guesses, but with their height difference Yuri's bony shoulder only grazes Yuuri's biceps, and the Japanese hides a smirk behind his collar.
Viktor, tying his shoelaces on a nearby bench, idly wonders where does so small a person hide such anger.
The youngster leaves to shower, a navy cloud of temperament shadowing his footsteps.
"Why does he have to be so rude?" Yuuri's words hold the echo of a weary sigh.
"That's just how he is, lovely Piglet mine. Nothing to be done about that."
Yuuri's frown turns into an embarrassed smile, rose powder dusting his cheeks. Viktor rises and comes to stand before him, light blue eyes smiling in kind. The Russian's fingers trail light as snowflakes up his lover's arm, coming to rest on the back of his neck, under a soft curtain of black hair. Viktor's head bends, just a little, so he's facing Yuuri properly, and Yuuri thinks Viktor is going to kiss him, and he feels anticipation blooming in his chest, a songbird unfurling its wings.
But Viktor merely allows their breaths to mingle, and speaks of another man (and were that man not a boy, in fact, and one they both know, Yuuri would be very mad indeed. As it his, he is mildly irritated.)
"Or perhaps Yurio wouldn't wake up on the wrong side of the bed, if someone were to keep him from turning over."
Yuuri touches Viktor's collarbone with his fingertips, hesitance dissipating at the sight of his enamored smile. "He's barely turned sixteen, Viktor. He's too young for that." Yuuri feels obliged to scold, though he thinks Viktor isn't serious. (But he can't be too sure – the Russian's sense of humor eludes him on the best of days)
"Ah, spoken like a true father, Yuuri." Yuuri chokes on air and reddens even further. "Besides, Piglet, love spares no one. And love as true as ours pays no mind to age, or gender, or religion."
Yuuri's smile turns breathtaking, and Viktor's heart misses a beat or two or three. He doesn't bother counting, these days. It's happening too often, too suddenly for him to do anything but enjoy the sensation.
Yuuri's tone takes on a contemplative note. "I hope he finds love, too. He deserves it."
Viktor hums a little and brushes his lips against Yuuri's, marveling for the twentieth time that day how soft they can be, how warm and welcoming and smiling. (He's not quite capable of thought, with Yuuri's mouth on his', but if he were, he'd hope that love made a more pleasant person out of Yuri Plisetsky.)
All things cease to matter and their universe blurs at the corners – all they see is each other and all they feel is love entwined with passion. But it doesn't last longer than a few seconds, because that's the moment Yuri chooses to make his entrance by slamming the door closed.
A dark scowl marring his delicate features, he crosses his arms and half-shouts, half-demands, "Well? Aren't we going to dinner?"
Viktor sighs despairingly, Yuuri smiles abashedly and Yurio scowls even harder, but they go to dinner anyway.
Zoya Romanova's streps are brisk, hovering on the edge of hurried, as she navigates the hectic foot traffic of Sankt Petersburg. There are so many people (doting grandparents and restless children, busy fathers and busier mothers, absent-minded teenagers and everything in between) that she sometimes gets jostled, or has her feet stepped on, but it doesn't bother her. (It used to, though.)
Zoya is nothing more than a short figure bundled in a grey jacket and she positively revels in it, the anonymity of being a girl aimlessly chasing pavements in a spring day that's close to ending.
It gives her hope that she can be anyone but who she actually is.
She hears church bells chiming in the breeze, so she looks at her watch and hastily bites back a curse when she sees the time. Zoya breaks into a run, straining her already aching calves. Some passerby crane their neck to watch her ebony hair make soundless waves in her wake, but most pay her no mind – she is just another youth, sprinting to catch her destiny by the collar and glare it into submission.
Five minutes later and Zoya is standing in front of Matryoshka, bent with her hands on her knees, panting as if she'd just run a marathon. She does her best to ignore the stitch in her side and commands her facial muscles into an overly friendly smile - the one she reserves for the most horrid of customers, the best she can manage while she is so tired she sways on her feet.
Zoya puts her hand on the quaint diner's door handle just as it open from the inside, and it all happens in a flash (it lasts no more than a heartbeat or a fluttering of wings and it marks the start of a new beginning): she is standing, mentally preparing herself for a few hours of sepia-tinted boredom, and then she is sprawled on the ground, a heavy, warm something holding her prisoner.
Zoya had closed her eyes on impact, scrambling for purchase where there was none, but now she opens them and finds herself staring into the most gorgeous pair of eyes she's ever seen: a turquoise so pure that makes her think of far-off waters caressed by sunshine, blonde lashes so lovely she wants to steal them for herself.
Zoya's marvel lasts all of a second; then, she begins screeching.
"Get off, you blind savage! Off, off, off!"
The boy quickly complies and scurries to half-crouch next to Zoya, a blush blooming high on his cheeks. But then he registers her words, and a fierce scowl takes hold of his face.
"Who are you calling a blind savage, you complete and utter moron?! That's a door right there" he viciously points to the offending object "which civilized people use for walking through. You can't just stand there and expect to keep your ugly mug intact!"
Their voices (loud, and louder still) are attracting an audience, and Zoya dimly registers a couple exiting the restaurant – a silver haired man wearing a soothing expression, and an Asian nervously wringing his hands.
"I was not just standing there, you unmannered waste of space!" Disdain is dripping from Zoya's words, and she jabs her pointer in the hollow of the blonde's throat, a courageous knight wielding a spear with the intention of slaying a dragon. "But when you open a door, you're expected to look in front of you before crossing the threshold, so you don't trample the poor soul there like a wild, shaggy, blonde goat!"
The boy's eyes are blazing like twin suns. "Sorry, midget, I don't usually look below eye-level."
They get up, movements jerky as to convey their general distaste for the other. Zoya can't help but feel like she's won a contest when she observes she's taller than him (she's never been so happy to wear heels).
"Yes, I suppose you'd be hard pressed to find someone shorter than you." A smirk adorns Zoya's face as she speaks and satisfaction is a drug in her bloodstream.
She sees the boy's hands fisting, skin drawn white-tight over his knuckles, and Zoya wonders if she's made a mistake and it's her face that will suffer the consequences. But the silver-haired man -the one who laughed earlier- closes his own long-fingered hand over the blonde's mouth, muffling another bout of expletives.
"He says he's sorry, Miss. Don't mind him – his height's just a very touchy subject." The man smiles genially, like someone plucked starts out of the night sky and pressed them to his lips. "He's going to behave now, aren't you, Yurio?" The last part he mumbles, but Zoya hears loud and clear, and has to suppress the sudden urge to laugh.
Zoya smiles, too, but decides to stares into the stranger's blue-green eyes. "Listen to papa, little rabid boy. He knows best."
His bright orbs spark with unadulterated fury, and Zoya is amused despite herself. She bends closer (making sure Yurio sees with crystal-clear certainty that she has, in fact, to bend) and tweaks his nose.
For good measure, she winks at him, too, and skips inside the diner, entirely ignoring the spectators, as if it were a common occurrence. The last thing Zoya sees before the door closes is the silver-haired man hugging the blonde brute with the strength and affection of a straitjacket, and the black-haired Asian standing in prime position for lecturing (hands on his hips, head shaking dejectedly from side to side and disapproval etched onto his features).
Zoya pushes the door closed and promptly walks behind the counter, high heels clacking on the hardwood floor. She nods at her fellow co-workers, humming a little to herself, and is pleasantly surprised to find her elderly boss in the back room, where she is searching for her uniform.
"You seem very happy today, Zoyachka." His gruff voice rings with cautious hope, like he wants to pour liquid sunshine and rainbows into her.
"Nothing so excessive, Mr. Antonov. Just laughing at the stupidity of boys these days."
He huffs out a snicker and good-naturedly ushers her to work, and Zoya thinks nothing can dampen her high spirits.
But clearly, clearly she forgot to factor in Lilia Baranovskaya, because this is what happens a couple or so hours later: the black-haired teen is tending to a table full of boys who keep staring at her chest, prerequisite fake smile pasted on her face, when she hear the bells above the door chime, signaling another customer. Still, all is fine, all is well, except that her feet hurt and she does her best to delay her going home.
Her fellow waitress, Anya (who despises being called Anastasia for reasons not disclosed) is barely juggling three full trays, so Zoya strides towards the newly occupied table and feels her smile crumbling to pieces. This is the last place she would expect so see a woman of Lilia's caliber enter (Zoya loves the diner and its homely atmosphere, but her mother's friend is too regal to fit with checkered tabletops and dusty music).
So if not for food, Zoya muses, Lilia can only be there to torment her. The teen marshes to her like a woman heading for the guillotine, her steps dragging, shoulders hunched in resignation.
"Oh, for God's sake, sit up straight, Zoyachka! Young ladies should glide when they walk, not stomp like petulant baby elephants."
"Good evening, Aunt Lilia." The former prima is not her relation, of course, but this is what Zoya has always called her, since she was a tiny sprite used to twirling in a sparkly tutu. "What can I get you?"
"Two of your best compositions, preferably for piano, preferably soon. And a coffee, while you're at it."
"I'm afraid that's not on the menu." Zoya's tone is a monotonous grey – it's not the first time Lilia has asked her for music, and it won't be the last instance she refuses. "How do you want your coffee? Pitch black?" ("Like your soul", Zoya wants to say yet doesn't, and Lilia hears it all the same.)
"Then change the menu." Lilia's tone brooks no arguments. "And make the coffee scalding hot, like the pits of the Hell I'll put you through if you continue to be obstinate."
To a stranger, it might seem like a fight – it's not. But it's not quite the warm affection it used to be, either (for now it's the best they can do).
"Old age has made you mean, Aunt."
"I am not old." Lilia enunciates stiffly, and a half-smirk seeps through Zoya's standoffish mask. The ballet dancer had aged elegantly, but aged nonetheless; she doesn't like it when people count her wrinkles and think "frail", so naturally, this is what Zoya endeavors to do.
"Of course not, Aunt."
"Enough nonsense." Lilia laces her hands on the merry red and white tabletop, and this is when Zoya's heart start beating a frenzied rhythm, because she realizes that this is not one of the older woman's half-hearted attempts to make her dust off her piano- she sees determination in Lilia's faded eyes, and they spell her misfortune. "You've been as stubborn as a mule for two years, and I accepted that because I thought you needed time to heal. But no more, Zoyachka."
"And who are you to make that decision for me?" Zoya's whisper is an angry whip against the dull chatter of the restaurant.
"Someone who loves you, who has your best interests at heart." Lilia's tone is as cool as ever, but emotion swirls in her eyes and breaks her composure.
"No." Zoya crosses her arms over her white T-shirt, feet spread in an almost combative stance. (It makes Lilia almost smile, to see that her favorite pretend-niece hasn't lost her inner fire.)
"Yes."
"You can't make me." An arched eyebrow, a challenge in her voice. Lilia hears it and already she tastes victory on her tongue.
"It would be such a shame if the authorities were to hear of your living conditions. And imagine what will the press say, when they hear about Russia's youngest music prodigy working for scraps in a no-name diner and looking dead on her feet. All because you refuse to write a couple of musical pieces, when I know it comes as naturally as breathing to you." Gently mocking to the last – that is Lilia, steel incased in silk, a gem polished until it cuts.
Zoya's complexion, already lily-white, whitens even further and her eyes are large with shock.
"You wouldn't do that." The teen's voice is a faint echo of what it is was minutes before. With no more false bravado, it holds a tremor so fine as to be nonexistent – but Lilia is looking for it, so she hears and ignores the sound of her own heart cracking.
"Of course I would."
"What do you want me to do?" Zoya's expression is pinched in anguish, even as she thinks up a thousand different rebellious ideas to get her out of this mess; none that she thinks will work, though, and desperation twists her insides.
"Come tomorrow at five o'clock to the ice rink I used to take you to when you were younger, and I'll introduce you to the boy you'll have to compose for."
"Fine." When Lilia stills remains seated, Zoya asks in a deceptively saccharine tone "Can I do anything else for you? Or are you simply waiting to destroy another aspect of my life tonight?"
"Don't be melodramatic, Zoya. Just my coffee, if you please."
Zoya goes to place the order, not even bothering with a nod or any such acknowledgement. Lilia purses her lips and remind herself that she's doing the right thing, even as remorse piles into a mountain in the confines of her heart.
When Zoya returns ten minutes later, she does so with a lukewarm coffee, so sweet it is a clean shot of diabetes. Lilia only finds out after she takes a sip and barely avoids choking on it. Still, she tips an enormous amount that Zoya takes begrudgingly, cheeks burning in shame, and leaves with as little fanfare as she'd entered.
The black-haired girl stares after her in thought, throat constricting with sobs barely kept at bay, and she wonders how she even dared to dream it could end in a different manner. When Anya shakes Zoya out of her stupor, she still doesn't speak, but gestures with elaborate hand-signs that her shift is over.
Zoya is concentrating on keeping appearances, so she misses Anya's concerned look. She lasts only until she reaches the staff's bathroom, where she curls up in a ball of misery and sorrow on the cold tiles. The music prodigy bites her fist until she draws blood and her mouth fills with the tangy taste of copper, tears sliding down her cheeks in a torrent of distress.
Her broken heart (the one she's worked so hard at patching up) breaks anew, and Zoya feels as fragile as spun glass - just as empty, just as cold.
If Aunt Lilia says she loves her –and she must, she must, because how can she not when she's been a second mother of sorts?- then why hadn't she done anything? If she knew her situation, why hadn't she moved a single finger to help her honorary niece?
Zoya doesn't know and doesn't resolve to ask – it's brief, the thought, but still she conjures it (was she as bad a niece as she was daughter? Is she so wholly unworthy without her silver tongue and fancy music? Unworthy even of love and kindness?)
Zoya desperately doesn't want the answer to be yes – but she can't help but entertain the idea that it is so, anyway.
Whew. There, it's done, and I'm a nervous wreck. I never actually realised how hard it is to convey something through writing, how much of a struggle it is to develop characters gradually. I mean, they live inside my head - they can hardly surprise me, can they? At the very least, I know everything about Zoya, and I'm not exactly sure how to make you feel the same. Oh, well. It would certainly help if you left a review. Or a favourite. Or a follow. Either. All of them. I'm not very picky. :)) Ok, shameless self-advertising - over. On that note, thank you very much to everyone who already did one of the above or simply read a measly one thousand words and decided to give me a chance. Thank you, really.
