#Victuuri week #Day 3: Viktor regret #Day 3: Yuuri doubt

Day 3: Je ne regrette pas d'être avec vous

There were many things Viktor regretted doing or not doing in his life. That was understandable; someone who had been on the public eye for so long like him, more so if you were the icon of a country as controversial as Russia, had to restrain himself from doing a lot of things, just not to tarnish his reputation.

Now, Viktor wasn't one to dull his flamboyant personality and his selfish demeanours just because of that – one example of that was when he bought a one-way ticket to Japan after watching a single youtube video - but still, there were times he had to refrain himself, or to act a certain way to please the others.

That situation brought some regrets to his life. Some were minor things, situations that were quickly forgotten with the whirlwind of his life as a celebrity, but other stayed, stabbing little pricks to his heart that sometimes nailed themselves deeper, making him struggle to keep his smile in his face.

For example, he regretted not insisting his parents to go with them to visit his grandmother, when he had been eight. Even thought he had been looking forward to it for weeks, that day he'd had an awful cold, and his parents had insisted he stayed at home to rest despite his protests, saying he could see his grandma the next time they visited.

There was never a next time.

It had been peaceful, they said. It had been in her sleep, in her armchair, draped in her favourite blanket, the one Viktor and her had bought at that market in St Petersburg. Everyone was surprised to see there was a small smile in her face when it happened, looking like she was having a nice dream.

But Viktor didn't see any of that, as he couldn't get out of his room by the funeral. That was another thing he regretted not doing. He spent whole days crying until there weren't any tears left to shed, and his throat was too sore to wail anymore.

The woman had been the one that taught him how to skate when he was little. She showed him that, no matter how many times he fell, he could still get up and keep going, leaving the pain behind. She showed him how fun it was to let yourself glide on the frozen waters of the lake near her little cottage at the countryside, the one who didn't laugh when he told her he wanted to be a professional ice skater, and the one who actually supported him to pursue his dreams.

Part of the reason why he was in there was for her, and he regretted not being able to say goodbye, and thank her for everything she had done.

Another thing he regretted was being so closed off when he started competing in juniors. It wasn't that he didn't like the other skaters, it was just that he didn't know how to behave around them. They didn't take him seriously at first – he was the rookie of the competition, and also painfully quiet. He was no threat at all.

Then it came his turn to skate, and the cocky confidence of the boys older than him were crushed to pieces.

He had won this competition, then the one after that. He heard sobbing behind closed doors, screams of rage at the boy who had destroyed their dreams, the boy who had been acting all along to make them drop their guard around him, the one who had cheated to be better than them. The boy that didn't deserve to win.

So he took it in himself to act confident and open, instead of being so reserved, regarding everyone with smiles and encouraging words until that personality became a part of him too. He wouldn't give them an excuse to blame their loss on him. If he was confident, he wouldn't be fooling anyone anymore, so their mistakes would be their own.

Things began looking up for him from there. He began having fans around the world, being drawn to his open rock star personality, even thought he was still a teenager. People looked up at him instead of whispering on his back, and younger skaters came to him with faces full of admiration. He loved all of it.

He let his hair grow when he was fifteen, the long platinum strands reminding him of his grandma's. People praised him for it, and he let it grow until he had to tuck it up in a ponytail, as it kept getting in the way when he skated.

That was when he made the mistake of taking for granted that his public loved him no matter what. Russia wasn't kind of any show of what they deemed 'inappropriate behaviour', and it seemed that Viktor's long hair fell into that category. They thought he was challenging the country by that bold action, and their hurtful critique began drowning the praised of his supporters.

It even came to a point that Yakov, one to ignore the ridiculousness that seemed to infect the people leaving in their mother country, asked him to remove his hair, not because he believed in the conservative discourse, but because he really feared what would happen to his top skater.

Viktor had rebelled for a while, too attached to his long strands to even think about cutting them, but in the end, he relented, and he snipped his long locks himself, watching mournfully how they fell one by one to the cold tiles of his bathroom.

He regretted caving into submission then.

He also regretted drowning in the strange routine the sparkling world of figure skating competitions brought him, to the point that it didn't excite him anymore. He was running out of ideas, he didn't know how to surprise his audience anymore. They expected more of him, like ravenous hounds waiting for a new miracle to happen, but Viktor was so tired.

He felt alone, more than ever in his life. Makkachin was his only companion in his long life, and although he loved the dog to bits, he longed for something more, a hand to hold, body warmth beside him, someone who didn't demand more of him, who was thrilled with whatever he could give them.

And then, Yuuri came, like a tidal wave that tilted his whole world upside-down. He was passion as he was tranquillity, beautifully bold and painfully shy at the same time. The man named Katsuki Yuuri was a constant change that left him winded and tingly, and so utterly happy that he wanted to scream it to everyone around. He maybe did it a couple of times.

Yuuri was something he had never, didn't and would never regret, in this life and many others to come their way. He had been a beacon of hope in his darkening world, he extended his hand to tug him out of his spiral of self-loathe, and comforted him with soft caresses so on character on him. He had accepted him on his side, and constantly reassured him that 'just Viktor' was fine.

He could drop all pretensions with him, all those ingrained personalities he had learnt to maintain with years, and Yuuri would be content. No, not content. Happy. He made the other skater happy, and only that brought joy to his life.

Yuuri thought Viktor had been his saviour when he came to Hasetsu, returning him his love for skating, but he didn't understand it was the other way around, that Yuuri had been the one to save him from falling to a destructive pit he was pretty sure he wouldn't be able to get out of.

Falling in love with him had been a natural step to take, one he didn't realise he was taking until he was knee-deep into it. One he neither regretted at the sightless.

However, what he regretted the most was that Yuuri didn't seem aware of any of it. His self-doubt was always in the way, always making him believe he didn't deserve all of his attention, when he was in reality the most precious thing he had ever had in his life.

He believed that Viktor belonged to the ice, to his fans, but he couldn't be more wrong about it. He had never belonged to any of it, they had only been the pathway threaded by destiny to make sure they both met.

But, as Yuuri had his back whenever he was feeling down, he had his, and he would make sure to remind him every day how treasured he really was. It didn't matter Yuuri didn't love himself – Viktor had enough love in himself for the both of them.

After all, Yuuri had been who had asked him to come to him, so Viktor would be the one to decide when to leave. And well, if he never left, that would be his problem.

And rest assured, because he would never, no matter what fate brought their way, regret it.