III

He never got Victor to talk about it since the little weird anxiety attack thing didn't happen again.

Instead, he got two Victors.

During training, it was Victor the coach, cold, detached, criticising to the point of being ruthless. Victor didn't step on ice himself, stood at the corner either with his arms folded or fists clenched. From a technical point of view, he was open to Yuuri's ideas; emotionally, he was shut tight, an unreadable smile on his face. It scared Yuuri to an extent he never mentioned about choreographing a new short program to Victor again.

At other times, it was Victor the boyfriend, inseparable and low-key bossy, requiring taking care of every detail in Yuuri's life, freaking out at a minor ankle sprain. It seemed Victor's whole world revolved around him, and after four long weeks, it began grating on Yuuri's nerves.

That was until last night, when he found a vulnerable Victor.

It was a chilly night and Yuuri had snapped awake owing to a dangerously full bladder. On the way back from the loo, he heard what sounded like Maccachin's low purrs from Victor's room (an engagement made public or not, Yuuri was too embarrassed to sleep with Victor down at Hasetsu when his parents had graciously allotted their precious Vic-chan the comfy guest room). He slid the door open and watched Victor crumbled inside the blanket, his face pressed against the pillow, mumbling incoherently yet loud enough to have woken the dog.

"Victor?"

Victor was in deep sleep, but that didn't help with the mumbling. Maccachin was licking at its paw; Victor had perhaps hugged his pet so tightly it hurt the poor animal. Yuuri reached out to comfort his silver-haired man. "It's okay," he whispered, "It's okay."

"Stop it... stop it..." Victor continued to mumble, eyes squeezed shut, dried up tears at the corners, "Someone stop it... I'm sorry..."

Yuuri nudged him. It was better trying to wake him up than watch him suffer through this ordeal. Victor barely blinked, conscious enough to figure Yuuri's presence under the dim light but too sleepy to be embarrassed about being discovered at his most broken. Childishly, he buried his head into Yuuri's shirt and gave in to the drowsiness.

Throughout the night, Yuuri lay by his side, watching the moonlight bounce off his silver hair and his chest heave up and down with every peaceful breath, his ice cold fingertips encased under Yuuri's palm. Let alone the recent onslaught of annoyance, Yuuri would bite down the pain even if Victor had bound him with iron shackles. Only if that resolved this problem.

"Moshi moshi. Yurio! How've you been?"

As expected, then came an immediate smackdown. "Oi, Katsudon! What's with this madness?!" Yurio sounded angry, as usual.

"Huh?"

"Why isn't Victor picking up his calls?! Yakov is eating my head here!"

"I - I don't know about this."

"He's cancelled performances, ad deals and conferences and what not. Stupid media's irritating everyone. Whatever recluse thing he's playing at, you tell that geezer to snap out of it!"

"Oh, okay - "

"We thought something - something happened to you again," he murmured, before adding hurriedly, "It's cold as hell in Russia! No news! Scary!"

"I'm fine, Yurio."

"Oi, I didn't ask! About that Victor, whatever he's doing. Tell him Yakov is asking to bring his lazy ass back to Russia if he's seriously considering his comeback."

"Alright."

Yuuri flipped the phone aside, and made his way to Victor's room, a certain bulbous anger rumbling inside his stomach. The room was empty; Victor had said he wanted to go to the Ramen shop and chat up with some friends he had made last time. The sheet over the mattress was crinkled; a bag that looked like a mini-briefcase lay at a corner beside his laptop, things flopping out of it.

Yuuri hesitated for a split-second, wondering if it was right to butcher Victor's privacy, but prioritized his moral call of duty. Yurio was right; unanswered letters, media mails in the spambox, over fifty missed video calls. Yuuri gritted his teeth. This was exactly what Yuuri asked Victor not to do when he agreed upon him not stepping down as his coach.

"We need to talk, Victor."

He was sure as hell Victor didn't like this stupidly ambiguous statement. Victor returned around midnight, a slight wintery blush on his face and perhaps a mood happier than what Yuuri had seen in the past few days. "Okay," the Russian man settled over on the mat, "Let's."

"You are planning to come back this season, right?"

Silence. Victor tripped over his words. "I'm - I'm at loss of inspiration."

"You're lying." Yuuri tried to be stern. Victor never stuttered.

At this point, Victor stopped making eye contact. He whispered darkly. "How would you know?"

"Because I do!" Yuuri felt desperate. Victor wasn't opening up to him, and this conversation was going nowhere. "Victor," he put a hand on his shoulder, "What's going on? Tell me. Are you still thinking about that accident?"

Yuuri sensed Victor flinch under his hand. "I hurt you," came a stoic reply.

"It was an accident, Victor."

"It was a mistake."

"No, it wasn't!"

"You weren't waking up."

"Victor - "

"My mistake."

For the lack of a better response, Yuuri wrapped him into a warm embrace. His heart broke into two as Victor didn't hug back, just sat there, detached, almost as cold and lifeless as a marble statue. Fair enough, thought Yuuri, which reminded him of what he had initially planned to discuss. Yuuri almost felt like mocking himself; he had begun the whole talk with such certainty, as if he himself was quite a talker.

I saw everything, Victor. How could you hide it all from me? Why hadn't you talked to me before about the accident? Will you stop killing your career this way? You made a promise that you won't. The only reason I'm still skating is because you said you won't. I don't know how to deal with this, Victor. You have done too much for me already. You don't need to carry this guilt. Yakov has called you back to Russia. I think you should go. We need to grow apart, Victor, or the way it's going, sooner or later I'll bring you down.

Of the world that he could've said, Yuuri handpicked the worst.

"Yakov has called you back to Russia. I think you should go. We need to grow apart, Victor."

The silver-haired man smiled, then pecked him on the cheek. "I see. Good night, Yuuri."

By morning, Victor was gone. All he left was a text in Yuuri's phone.

Dasvidaniya, love.

Yuuri felt hot tears rush up to the surface, and he made no attempt to stop them. This was the second time Victor had left him after a talk, this time owing more to Yuuri's own fault than a miscommunication. He noticed Maccachin sleeping at the feet of his bed; Victor had left the poodle to Yuuri's care, or perhaps the other way around.

He glanced out of the window at the slow falling snow. The morning was shivery cold, and after a long while, Hasetsu began to reek of emptiness again. He stared down at the animal wagging its tongue, its big loyal brown eyes expectant. "What have I done, Maccachin?"

"Why don't you talk to Victor-kun?"

Yuu-chan asked him absent-mindedly when he wandered into Ice Castle a few days later, at loss about what to do yet tired of the mourning.

"I think it's better this way," said Yuuri, never minding the sinking sensation inside him, "Away from me, he can be Victor Nikiforov again. The Victor whom everyone looks up to."

Since he had no news of Victor, he had forced himself to assume Victor must be doing well, must've had rejoined training at Russia, and must be preparing to buckle up for the Nationals. At this, Yuu-chan didn't seem particularly convinced. "You sure? You both looked so happy together."

Yuuri's insides flipped in anticipation. Together, huh? Yes, together. Again. Someday.

Pushing his thoughts at the back of his head, he pulled out a CD from his bag and handed it to her. "Please play this for me."

She glazed over the title. "Chopin Ballade Op 23 G Minor... Yuuri-kun, have you prepared a new routine?"

More like a message. The way skaters could communicate best. After all, Yuuri had a bad repute with words. He put his glasses down at the side of the rink and gave a heads-up at the triplets, who kept a video-camera steady as the music began.

He never gave a lot of thought to the music before. Following choreographies created for him, it struck him how much he used to depend upon muscle-memory, how the work he had to do was less about creation and more about interpretation. He had always wanted to create too. He was no genius like Victor, but he had to take his first step somewhere.

But midway he lost it. He forgot the meticulous step-sequence he had planned; instead his arms flailed about with the crescendo, his skates slid according to their own will. A combination spin that didn't seem to go with the piano became the sound of his soul writhing apart. The sound of separation.

We exist because we skate. We skate because we exist. I may not understand the music or the tempo, but I understand this ominous thumping inside my chest. It's called love, and it begins and ends with you.

Victor, that dummy.

The music had stopped and he was left on his knees in the middle of the ice, thinking, panicking, and panting for breath. That was, till he was distracted by Yuu-chan banging her palms upon the walls as loudly as she possibly could, her eyes widened with amazement. "Sugoiiii Yuuri-kun!" she exclaimed, like how she had when Yuuri first showed her his perfect copy of Stammi Vicino, "Are you going to post this online?!"

He scratched the back of his head, flushed and unnerved, not sure what to say. "It- It's supposed to be personal."

It was supposed to be just for Victor. Yuuri wanted to communicate, wanted him to know what he was going through, not to mention his coach's opinion on his first choreography would be like icing on the cake. However, he loitered around for several days, watching, rewinding, and eventually hating the video before he gathered enough courage to mail it to Victor.

He fell back into the pillow, scratching Maccachin who had snuggled up beside him, his gaze fixed at a lone poster of Victor Nikiforov on the wardrobe (pulled out of his never-to-be-touched-again fanboy stash), his thumb hovering over the send button, his insides flip-flopping anxiously. It had been already a week and four days. He didn't wish to disturb Victor during training. Worse even, he didn't want him to see the video in public. All of sudden, he saved the mail in drafts and decided to text Yurio instead.

He wasn't sure how to write it. In any case, he typed: 'Hi, Yurio. I hope your training's going well. I just wanted to know how Victor is doing, it'll be good if you don't tell him about this text, not sure if he wants to talk to me atm :)'

Yuuri wasn't a hundred percent sure but what followed was a voice message from Yurio that more or less sounded like a string of Russian expletives. Before Yuuri could make any sense of it, his cellphone beeped again.

'Victor is not in Russia.'

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