"C'mon, Yuugo. Just… try letting go of the wall. Please?"
"Hell no."
Yuuya sighs at the mulish expression on his brother's face as he only ends up tightening his grip until his knuckles turn white. He doesn't have the heart to tell him that he looks absolutely ridiculous. "Yuugo. How else are you supposed to learn?"
Yuugo only glares. And sort of hisses like a cat. " Why would I want to learn to move on ice with a pair of blades strapped to my feet? Is this a joke? Are you having me on?"
"Skating. It's called skating," Yuuto cuts in wearily, stopping just next to Yuuya with his arms crossed. "You agreed to this, remember?"
Personally, Yuuya thinks just getting Yuugo into a pair of skates and out on the ice was already a great victory. "Skating is fun," Yuuya cajoles, pushing out into the center of the rink to demonstrate and pulls himself into a basic spin. "See? And it's useful."
"You mean for like when hell actually freezes over?" Yuugo grumbles and looks unconvinced.
"Besides," Yuuto interjects, deciding to pull out his trump card. "Just look at Yuuri."
The three of them swivel their heads towards the center of the ring, just in time to see Yuuri land from a perfectly executed double axel. He notices them gaping and scoffs. With a careless flick of his hand, he tosses his hair over his shoulder, lips forming syllables that look a lot like 'tch, amateurs'.
"...You just want to laugh at me when I fall, you jerks," Yuugo grumbles, but Yuuya can see that his grip is loosening and there's a familiar, troublesome glint in his eyes.
He chalks one up for good old-fashioned sibling rivalry.
"You can hold onto me until you get used to it?" Yuuya suggests.
And that's how Yuuya spends the next twenty minutes losing feeling in his right hand from the force of Yuugo's death grip as they made depressingly slow circles around the rink. Yuugo's pathetic shrieks every time he so much as wobbled would have been much funnier, Yuuya laments, if he didn't choose his ear to scream into.
"Oh my god, oh my god, this is crazy, I'm crazy, why did I agree to this?" Yuugo laments, turning a shade paler as he nearly slips again.
Yuuto, since he's not the one losing his circulation or his hearing, has no compunctions about enjoying the spectacle, judging by the nearly Yuuri-level smirk on his face. But he hovers close by just in case.
"You're doing great," Yuuya lies as encouragingly as he can. His ring and pinky fingers are now completely numb. "Maybe… you can try to take a few steps on your own? Please ?"
Yuugo looks stricken and glares at him with betrayal in his eyes. "What? No! You said I could hold on to you!"
"Yuugo, please," Yuuya wheedles, desperately trying to pry his fingers off. "Just a few steps. We believe in you."
Eventually, the combined might of Yuuya's begging and Yuuto's slightly inflammatory comments convinces Yuugo to let go for just a few steps. Yuuya immediately feels bad upon seeing Yuugo's abandoned-puppy expression and tells himself it's really for his own good.
He holds out his hands. "Alright, Yuugo. Just… move your feet a little. Push off and keep your back straight."
Yuugo breathes in deeply and takes a step. And another. When he still hasn't fallen over by the fifth step, Yuuya is cautiously optimistic. In fact, Yuugo makes it all the way and returns to triumphantly death-gripping his hand before he trips.
Of course, when Yuugo goes down, he instinctively reaches out with his free hand to try to steady himself with the nearest available upright object.
Which happened to be Yuuto's scarf.
They all go down together in a flurry of flailing limbs and panicked cries and collapse into a groaning pile of pain and misery.
Thankfully, something soft cushions Yuuya's landing right before Yuugo and Yuuto's bodies knock the wind out of him. Not so thankfully, his new cushion has angry magenta eyes and a terrifying scowl.
"You dunces," Yuuri says sweetly, "have exactly three seconds."
Although he never does end up elaborating, there is a mad scramble to be the first to get off him.
"Oh," Yuuya says as he flees towards the exit as if the devil was on his heels. "You're doing it, Yuugo!"
