Burning Ice

by karlyhigurashi

During a casual performance of his duet with Yuuri, Victor fell forward after losing his balance, despite knowledge of the fall's risk. He made this decision in an attempt not to collide with Yuuri and injure them both, resulting in a detrimental knee injury that forced him into permanent retirement. Finally at the height of his career, Yuuri decides to skate on, for them both.

25. Chapter 25

It turns out throwing up in the emergency room isn't any better than throwing up in a hotel room.

Once Yuuri starts dry heaving again I complain to the work staff, using the potential contagiousness as an excuse to have him more quickly examined. As expected, it's nothing more than food poisoning...though I haven't the foggiest idea where he could have gotten it from. As far as I could tell, his vomit was made quite clearly up of two components: chocolate cake and champagne. It could of course had been contracted earlier and only surfaced with symptoms after the competition...and if that's the case, I am even more grateful for our golden lining.

They hook him onto an IV to keep him hydrated and have him sleep in a room for the night, leaving me to hold off the press who begin to question our disappearance after Yuuri's second finalist gold medal this year.

Now when I say "hold off" the press, I'm essentially referring to the number of phone calls and emails I have to send on my walks to, from, and within our hotel stay-though there are also times when reporters will catch me in my transit and stop to question me more directly. Once I realize that fans and broadcasters are still lurking in the city, filling up the media with new headlines amidst their temporarily standstill travel plans after the GPF, I try as best as I can to quit the meaningless pacing and stick to our room, isolated and surrounded by a new rosy detergent smell. It's the first time in months that Yuuri and I aren't together at night, and now even the scent of his sweat has been purged from our sheets.

I don't sleep very well that night. I can't seem to get the chilly feeling out of my legs, having grown accustomed as I once was, long ago, to the warmth of sleeping beside another person. It's not really that which keeps me awake, though, nor merely the worry for how Yuuri is doing alone at the hospital, but rather a new, frightened chill in my chest. I've never really felt this way before. It's a cold, anxious dread. I bring my hands to my own pectorals, just like I normally do wrapping around Yuuri's body, and try to physically warm up the spot. In that tight, melancholy position, I convince my mind to shut down and sleep.