CHAPTER TWO HUNDRED SIXTY SEVEN

The light in the room had darkened significantly with the setting of the winter sun. Perhaps the swift change from dim-ambiance of daylight to the pitch dark of early sunset was what roused the younger skater from sleep before the alarm on his phone went off, but those tired hazel eyes started to open.

Yuri blinked slowly as he realized wakefulness had taken hold of him. The next thing he noticed was how nothing was against his back; just the blanket and the cool air where his shoulders and left arm was exposed. It was a rare thing that Viktor was in front of him when he woke up rather than behind. But, there the man was, the left side of his face pressed to Yuri's chest where he'd been slightly tilted on his back, right arm draped over his side, legs lazily woven together under the sheets. Yuri pulled his arm back a bit, hand brushing against the Russian's messed-up silvery hair. His right arm was under his partner's head, not quite acting like a pillow, given the Russian's broad shoulders, but finding its place in the gap under the man's neck. He reached with that hand to fumble for the phone he knew was there somewhere. When he found it, he turned it enough to click the screen on just long enough to see the time.

5:32pm

...And the frantic text message from Phichit.

[Yuri! Can you bring my stuff for the SP? Ciao Ciao and I meant to swing by, but we didn't want to impose after what happened at practice...]

He thumbed a simple reply, [ya np]

Still about 10 minutes before my alarm is even supposed to go off...but I don't think I'll be able to fall asleep again...

He returned his attention to the silver legend in his arms, the fingers of his free hand still woven through that hair.

.

"I know you don't mean it, but there are times that I wonder if you have my back as much as I have yours. Maybe it's a flaw on my part. You and I have such drastically different histories... You come from a much healthier place than I do, and I've struggled just to be open and honest about what I think and how I feel. But...there's just...so much happening now..." Tears rolled down Viktor's cheeks again, "I'm at a breaking point, and all I want is to go home and cry."

.

Have I really been that bad...? Yuri wondered, his brows furrowed as he worried. He hugged his spouse a little tighter then, gently rubbing the side of his jaw against the man's messy fluff of hair, stopping only when he felt the sharp pain of pressure against the deep cut on his chin. He pulled back with a wince, bringing his left hand up to feel at the tender line in his skin, then moving it up to feel for the same thing on his forehead; that cut, and the smaller one right next to it, were significantly more tender than the one on the side of his chin, but Yuri only noticed when something was pressing into it. He could only wonder how bad the bruise looked. My hair covers most of this thing...but I won't be able to hide it when I'm skating. What a pain...

Viktor stirred a little at that point, mumbling a sleepy moan against his partner's skin, arms curling in a little where they went around the other skater's waist. He wasn't immediately aware that Yuri was already awake, but when he felt the hug around his head, he smiled and turned his face to kiss the center of the man's chest.

"...Sorry, did I wake you up?" Yuri wondered quietly, returning his hand to where it had been a moment before, brushing his fingers through silver hair and cupping it gently around the back of the Russian's head.

"Hm? No...I think I was just ready to." The elder skater answered, legs straightening as his whole frame tightened in a still-sleepy stretch. When he went lax again, he wiggled to make his way up the bed a little, until he was nose-to-nose with his husband and nuzzled in closer again, "I don't think I ever heard an alarm though. Are we going to be late?"

The answer came in a kiss. Yuri tilted his head a bit to the right and leaned in, holding lightly for a moment before pulling back again, only to repeat it before settling again, "No, there's still a little while before my phone's set to go off. We have some time."

"I guess that's a good thing then." The Russian purred, leaning in to steal more kisses, feeling his partner's arm slide around his own, a hand settling on the back of his shoulder, "Is it weird that after taking such a short nap, I feel more rested now than I did after last night...?" He mused quietly.

"I don't think so. I kinda feel the same." The younger figure answered, rubbing his thumb gently across his partner's skin where he held on, leaning in a bit closer to press his brow against the man's forehead, "...I'm...sorry for how I've acted towards you lately. I've been acting selfishly again. I wasn't trying to hurt you, I was just..." He paused and drew in a nervous breath, "...I guess I was just trying to prove to myself that I wasn't as hurt as I actually was. In the end I just ended up wounding the both of us."

"...Thank you."

"...So what do we do now?" Yuri wondered, looking into that blue eye just in front of himself, "I don't know that a serious talk, post-conflict carnal urges, or a nap are going to change the fact that I'm hopeless with my quads at this point."

"I had a dream about it." Viktor answered easily enough, "So I have some ideas."

"Yeah?"

"Mh." He nodded lightly, "I don't want you to do anything that'll very likely cause you to fall. So...if you want to do any quads, keep to the easy ones...Loops and Toe-loops at most. Drop the rest to triples."

Yuri made a face, and nodded reluctantly, "...Yeah..."

"Hey." Viktor nosed his partner to bring those brown eyes back up again, "Before I ever set foot in Hasetsu, you were already well-known for your high presentation scores. Your programs this season are really expressive. Go back to your roots a bit and remind everyone exactly why you made it to Sochi in the first place."

The younger figure was still a bit apprehensive, "...Yeah..." He repeated.

"Yuri."

"...Nnhhhhh..."

"Yuri."

"I knooowwww..."

"Just because you did badly in Sochi doesn't mean your scores today will be the same as back then. Everything you did at that Final suffered, not just your jumps. It won't be the same here." The Russian tried to explain.

"I just don't like thinking about Sochi in general...it was a really rough weekend."

"It's the weekend you seduced me though!"

"But I don't remember doing it!" Yuri reminded, pushing up a bit to force his partner to his back, and flopped on top of the man's chest, giving an anxious look where he parked his chin in center, "My last clear memory of Sochi is hearing you offer to take a commemorative photo with me, only for me to turn my back on you and think, 'How could I possibly meet my idol like this?'"

"Ah...yeah, I remember how weird that was." Viktor mused, reaching up to comb his fingers through that black spiky hair on the uninjured side, "All the times we'd crossed paths before then, you always got really excitable and took off running. That time though, you just stared at me blankly and turned your back, walking slowly away while Ciao Ciao wondered why you'd turned me down. ...Now that I think about it..." He pulled his hand back and settled the knuckle of his index finger on his lip, eyes turned up a bit in recollection, "...The way you walked off like you did, I think that's a big part of why I ended up falling for you at the Banquet later."

"...Eh?" One hazel eye squinted in a confused look.

"Well, think about it." The silver Russian pointed out, bringing his free arm up to curl under the back of his head while the other went back to rest over his husband's shoulder, "The demi-girlfriend I'd had before my winning-streak started was a mega-fan of mine. Even if her dog had died, and she had come in last place at the first Grand Prix Final she'd qualified for...none of that would've mattered. To her, I was just a thing she wanted. So devoid of meaning that taking a photo with me was exclusively a selfish venture. But to you..." He lightly stroked the back of his fingers against his partner's cheek, and gave an adoring look, "...Taking that picture when you felt so bad already..."

"...I felt like I would've been unloading my baggage onto you." Yuri finished the thought, "And I didn't want to do that to you in what could've been called our first true interaction. If I was going to be taking a photo with you, I wanted it to be because I'd succeeded, and earned the privilege of standing next to a World Champion."

"So you see? It was different." Viktor went on, "Shallow and empty people will take anything they can get, regardless of what it does to those around them. Going into that Banquet, I could already tell that there was nothing you ever said or did that didn't take others' feelings into consideration."

"...Unless I bang my head on something." The younger figure sighed a bit, "Then I act like a jerk who doesn't think about anyone else at all."

"And I forgive you for that." The Russian said quietly, "The way you reacted when I told you...I could tell that you hadn't meant it the way I took it. So...now that we're both on the same page again...I think you'll actually listen to me when I tell you what I think."

Yuri nodded silently, feeling guilty all over again.

Viktor slid his whole hand under those raven-black bangs, and pushed them all up into the skater's performance style, thinking about the big cut that came down on his forehead. He could see where Yuri's eye was squinting a bit from the pain of it though, and let go quickly, "I know you don't want people to take pity on you when you're out there. Everyone and their mother will already know about the accident...and if they somehow don't, then they'll find out when Phichit goes out instead of JJ. So...let's do what we can to stop them from worrying about whether you'll mess up. I can cover the bruises well enough that these cuts will be hard to see while you're moving."

"How...?" The younger figure looked on in confusion.

"Even my skin isn't flawless all the time. I carry a bit of make-up around just in case."

"...Oh...I knew that, but..."

"I'm a bit paler than you are." Viktor nodded, "But I-"

beee beee BEEE BEEE BEEE BEEE BEEE

Yuri grunted quietly and twisted to reach for his phone, silencing it, "It's 5:45."

The Russian nodded reluctantly, and pushed up onto an elbow as he moved to sitting upright. He reached his right hand forward again as the left parked in the sheets to hold his weight, "...As I was saying... I'm a bit paler than you are, but I think I can make it work anyway. After that...just focus everything on your choreography and spins..."

The younger figure bobbed his head in grudging agreement.

"In a way, it's almost like how I plan to compete next year myself." Viktor offered, sliding his hand down from his husband's shoulder to thumb the man's lip lightly, "Going mostly for style points instead of jumps."

"...I guess so."

"Don't spoil it for yourself before you've even set foot on the ice, Yuri." The Russian recommended, "Remember what I told you before? The way your body moves, it's like you're making music. Sing out to everyone that nothing can stop you."

"...There's something you're forgetting though."

"...I am?" Blue eyes blinked in confusion.

"'Skate like you're trying to seduce me.'" Yuri's dour expression changed over to a worried but hopeful smile, "At least, that's what I plan to do."

The silver skater's eyes got watery and excited all at once, and he couldn't help but lean forward to happily kiss the man in front of him, both arms going around the younger figure's frame as he pulled back again, "That's just what I like to hear."