[A/N: Thanks for sticking with me and reading all the chapters so far, guys! I've decided on how I'm going to bring the story to a close, so prepare yourselves: it'll only be a half dozen more chapters (and the last few are quite brief). I'm glad to have had the support of all of you along the way, you kept me at it!]
Forty eight hours, thirty six awake, twelve asleep. I wake up at four a.m. to the sound of yet another notification ringtone, this one piercing through my dream and jolting me back to reality. I'm not sure which is worse: the initial panic of waking without anyone beside me or the nightmarish world that the sound freed me from. Regardless, I reach for my phone on the overhead shelf and open my email inbox, immediately being greeted by a hoard of 28 new replies.
Slowly but surely, I address each one of them. Before I even get out of bed for a drink of water, it's seven o'clock. Still several hours before the hospital visiting hours, I reconnect my phone to the charger and fix myself a bowl of rice for breakfast, occupying myself with the morning news.
It's not much fun trying to interpret alone, so I listen to the droning foreign voices to fill up what would have been silence and wait for time to pass me by.
At nine o'clock I ready myself for the cold morning air. Neglecting the apparent need for a shower, I head out into the street and amble my way to the hospital, listening to Yuuri's Autumn 2016 free skate song through my headphones. When I finally arrive they direct me to his room immediately, handing me a business card with instructions written in English on the back. I navigate through the heated maze of halls with ease, climbing several flights of stairs and walking a significant distance in the process. Soon enough I find it: D416.
"Knock knock," I say, taking the onomatopoeia as invitation enough given the already agape door. Yuuri has the room all to himself, the bed beside him empty, and his face is still and peaceful in slumber. I settle down beside him, the boredom from the morning immediately dissipating despite his sleeping state. Just being beside him and seeing him there is enough to brighten my mood. A few minutes pass before a nurse comes in, asking me if she should wake him up. As much as I don't want to disturb him, he has gotten about eighteen hours of sleep by now, and the nurse's words seem more of a prompt than a suggestion. I nod, giving her the okay, and she shakes his shoulder gently to wake him.
"Victor," is the first word he groggily mutters, before he even fully opens his eyes.
"Hey sleepyhead," I smile, his hoarse voice filling me with warm admiration.
"Good morning," he smiles back, tipping his head back to yawn.
"How do you feel?" I ask, reaching for his hand. It's warm, to my surprise.
"Mm...hungry," he says, lifting a balled up fist to his crusty eyes adorably.
"That's good," the nurse nods, handing him a breakfast menu, "If you keep down a meal, we'll be ready to send you home. You seem to be doing fine after the rest, so we've got to get your energy back now."
Yuuri nods, thanking her for the menu and for caring for him, and she tells him to just ring when he's made his selection. He scans through his options, not caring particularly for the sound of anything, but eager for his first bite of solid food nonetheless.
When the porridge arrives Yuuri eats slowly, as instructed. He lets me have the soy milk, claiming it bothers his stomach, so I take a sip each time he raises the spoon to his mouth. Several conversationless but lighthearted minutes go by, and I begin to notice Yuuri's solemn examination of me.
"Your knee is all swollen," he finally announces.
"Well, I practically carried you here yesterday," I chuckle, ignoring the basic meaning of his words.
"I don't even remember what I was doing before we got into the emergency room," he admits, looking apologetically at me.
"It's fine...I'm glad you're feeling better," I smile at him, longing for the sensation of his soft lips against mine but resisting the urge. He swallows another spoonful of the soupy mixture and I take a sip from my carton.
"You should get it checked up on," Yuuri says, focusing on my knee again, "while we're here."
"If it'll put your mind at ease, I will," I agree, fumbling through the pocket of my peacoat, still hanging behind the bed from the day before when I draped it over his trembling shoulders. I find my wallet and my insurance card, slipping them into the pouch of my sweatshirt.
I watch him finish eating, already having drained the carton of milk dry, his face bright and happy both from my compromise and by the taste of his first meal in a long while. When the nurse comes back to collect the tray she directs me to the rehabilitation floor, and I assure Yuuri that I'll be back as soon as I can.