CHAPTER THREE HUNDRED EIGHTY TWO
The kotatsu vibrated twice and bing'd with the arrival of another text message. Leaning over to look, Yuri then reached for it to pull it up in front of himself, "Looks like they're done. Minako-sensei is okay."
Viktor tilted his head slightly to see around his partner's and oogled at the screen, reading [Okay they're done] and [She left her phone on the bed and stepped into the hall for something, so she didn't pick up cuz she didn't know it was ringing.] He huffed a quiet laugh and settled back again, "Guess she went to get ice or something and just left her phone behind."
"Yeah probably." Yuri agreed, trying to thumb a reply, but finding his phone and arms behind nudged up as Jiro wiggled his way under the arch they made. The pup made a few silly whimpery noises as he moved forward, leaving wet marks on Yuri's face before finally settling his head against his neck and one shoulder.
The Russian booped the pup's nose, prompting a little pink tongue to come out and lick the spot. At the opposite end of the couch, Makkachin was being a very goodboi, using his blanket and his ample fluff to be a foot-warmer for three, and a foot-elevator for one. Viktor nudged the dog's chest where his unhurt ankle was pinned down under one lanky poodle-limb, and Makkachin's tail poffed up a few times before settling down again, "I'm not sure what I'm more excited for at this point...getting to troll Euros or getting to bring the dogs with us."
"Maybe we should get Jiro trained up as a Therapy Dog." Yuri suggested, sending his confirmation reply to Nikki before setting his phone back down again, "Then we could use my penchant for anxiety attacks as a good excuse to get him into competitions."
"...Am I being replaced?" Viktor pouted.
Yuri huffed and turned his head, bringing his hand up to nudge at the side of his husband's face, tilting it enough towards him that he could kiss the edge of his lips, "Never. But dogs can sense them coming before they happen, even before the person who gets the attacks."
"...Are you getting anxious now? Is that why Jiro's cuddling you like this?"
"Who knows?" He turned back and gently stroked his hand down the length of the puppy's back, petting him softly to sleep, "But it's the first thing that came to mind right as you were saying we're bringing the dogs to Austria. My first thought was getting them both vests and claim they're emotional support dogs, but-"
"Yurio would never let you hear the end of it." Viktor teased, "His big thing may be cats, but animal welfare in general is a huge deal to him. Not just for the animals, but for the sake of stopping people from putting the animals into weird situations. He once railed for over an hour about how people were getting vests for their dogs online, so they could take them onto planes, only for the dogs to bite kids and then get euthanized for being vicious."
"Yeah I thought of that almost as quickly," Yuri gave a nervous smile, "That's why I settled on the actual Therapy Dog idea. Jiro would actually have to be qualified and trained...but giving an Akita a job is really healthy for them. They can get pretty unruly if they're bored."
"You don't think Makkachin needs a job?"
"Makkachin's job is being fun."
Viktor laughed at that, "And he wins Associate of the Quarter every time for it."
"Exactly."
.
[Did you hear what he said in the hallway just now?]
[He sounded really angry...anyone speak English that knows what he said?]
[I came out too late and most of it was already over. I thought I heard him saying something about Twitter? I'm not sure.]
[What was Asahi-kun doing in the spectator hotel anyway? Who was that woman he was with? A fan that he's having a fling with?]
[I'd have a fling with him it it'd make him feel better!]
[Half the audience would do that]
[He's never hooked up with a fan before! Why would he start now?]
[I was on a call with a friend of mine in Britain when we heard the yelling in the hall. I had him on speaker and he says that Asahi-kun was saying he wanted to die! Why would he say stuff like that!? He just won Silver!]
[What's wrong with Asahi-sama!?]
[Everyone calm down. The lady he was with seemed to be trying to talk to him about it.]
[Someone do something!]
[Should we call an ambulance for him..?]
[I wouldn't...not yet anyway. That might just make it worse for him. He's upset about something, but he's not standing on a ledge right now. Give that lady a minute to talk him down.]
[Anyone but me think this is connected to how WEIRD the medaling ceremony was? Those three didn't exchange a single word or glance between one another. Viktor is ALWAYS super nice to the other people on the podium! Even if he doesn't know them! But this time, NOTHING!]
[Not just Viktor...but Yuri, too. Yuri and Asahi were rink-mates in Juniors. Did they have a falling out? Is that why it took Asahi so long to come back? Him and Yuri nearly retired at the exact same time back then.]
[I hope this turns out to be nothing...I was so excited when his Club said he was coming back to competition! I wish he'd get on social media so we'd know how he's doing!]
.
Minako pulled the door closed behind herself, and pulled her purse-straps up over her shoulder, then reached to take the arm of the silent figure waiting for her. They all-but tip-toed through the hall, hoping not to attract any further attention to themselves after the outburst from minutes earlier. However, it was unmistakable that a few doors clicked open as they passed; fans that had been keeping vigil through the spy-hole in case anyone walked by. The two snuck around the corner to the elevator waiting area, and passed wordlessly down to the largely-empty main lobby.
Asahi didn't bother to mummy-wrap his head again as they pushed through the doors. It was cold, but it wasn't snowing at all. What snow was already on the ground crunched under their boots as they made their way back to the official hotel. It was quiet there as well, save for the late-night staff of the front desk. The two went for the elevators to go up, then made their way towards the athlete's room.
"...I left my keycard in my bag." He said suddenly, "Sorry, I didn't think about it until I didn't have anything to reach for..."
The door opened abruptly though, and Coach Nagisa was standing within, phone to her ear and a scared look on her pale face, "ASAHI!"
He blinked at her in confusion, [...Yes?]
[I HAVE BEEN TRYING TO CALL YOU FOR 7 MINUTES STRAIGHT, WHY WOULDN'T YOU PICK UP!?] She barked, pulling her phone away to show its face, and display the fact that she was, in fact, trying to call him right that second.
Asahi nervously reached under his jacket to pull his phone out from his back pocket, seeing the incoming call, but also noting the fact that it wasn't ringing or buzzing. He quickly turned the device over and unmuted it with the switch on the top left side, [Sorry. It was muted before the Free Progr-]
[M-MUTED!?] The woman leaned out of the doorway and dropped herself over the skater, [You don't know how worried I've been! SNS is losing its mind! Rumors are spreading like wildfire about some really dark things you said! What's going on!?] She only then spotted Minako standing nearby, [And why are...why are you with him...?]
"Nagisa-kōchi...ochitsuke..." [Calm down.] Asahi attempted, pushing her away again, and then ushered her fully back into the room, [She's the person I said I was going to go meet earlier.]
Minako followed carefully, but only stood within the doorway enough to keep the panel from shutting her out. She watched and listened quietly, waiting for the cue to give her small nod to the circumstances and then take her leave.
It was, after all, getting precariously close to 2am.
The older woman stood on her own again, tossing her phone to the blankets of a nearby bed as she reached both hands forward to press her palms against the man's face, [You look like you've been crying! What happened!?]
Asahi grumbled under his breath and nudged his coach's hand's back, [I cried. It's better now.]
[Why are you spending time alone with Viktor and Yuri's friend? Where are they anyway? What have you been doing!?]
The skater was starting to get impatient, and shook his head, [I don't know where they are; I wasn't invited to spend time with them...I was invited to spend time with her.] He thumbed over his shoulder at the ballerina, [We just talked. That's it. Now I want to go to sleep. She just came all this way to make sure I didn't...get lost in the snow or something.]
[ASAHI-]
[Where's Webber anyway? Shouldn't he be here?]
Coach Nagisa was getting impatient as well, [He went out looking for you after the things I told him were being said online! You've got half the skating community losing their minds over you right now! Why would you say such dark and horrible things!? You're better than this!]
Asahi leveled her a rather serious look, but then pulled back a step or two, [I don't need or want anyone freaking out. That'll just make everything worse. If you really want to help...don't ask me things right now and don't judge me. Just tell everyone on that damn SNS thing that I'm fine and not to speculate. It's none of their business. I was just...venting a little.] He explained vaguely, [Now I just want some space.]
Minako watched as the other woman continued to hover, following Asahi around the room as he seemingly tried to carry-through with his plans to go to bed. However, the more she heckled him, even under the guise of concern for his well-being, the more the ballerina could tell he'd probably get no sleep in those conditions. She sighed and pushed off the door-frame, pushing the panel off of where she'd put her foot down as a door-stop, [Asahi, since we've already been through the ringer on all this, do you want to just camp out at my place for tonight?]
Both of them looked up and back at her, each one wondering WHY in their own ways.
She deadpanned them back, but then sharply turned her head, pushing the door even further open, [I don't have all night! I'm tired, too! It's been a long weekend and there's still tomorrow's Exhibition to deal with!]
Asahi blinked at her in stunned surprise, but his body moved on auto-pilot rather quickly, grabbing up his gear bag before running him into the bathroom for his toiletries, and then out the door again, moving with the efficiency of a soldier. He paused only once he was outside again, and looked back in, [Coach, I'll see you at Exhibition practice in the morning. Please tell SNS what I said.] He bowed towards her, then rushed out of sight before they could argue.
Minako waved and let the door close, leaving the stunned woman behind inside the hotel room. She quickly hopped to catch up, barely making it as Asahi was hitting the button for the elevator to come back. Thankfully, the carriage they'd come up in had never left, and the doors opened immediately. The athlete quickly went in and leaned against the nearest wall, poking at the button for the Lobby level, and exhaled a sigh.
"...She's a good coach...but she tries too much to be motherly sometimes." He complained quietly, "Maybe it works for other people, but to me it just feels suffocating."
"I can see why." Minako agreed, "Swaddling someone who's claustrophobic will just make the panic more intense."
"Yeah..."
The elevator moved down in silence for a few more seconds, pausing on another floor to open the doors, though there was no one outside to board.
Asahi hit the Close Door button and their journey continued, and he lowered his eyes to the baseboards. The cogs were continuing to turn in his mind, even as the doors opened again to release them back into the world. Minako didn't press him for more as they traversed the public domain, even after they were outside again and the few minutes of perceived solitude they shared. It wasn't until the doors closed on her hotel room again that either of them said another word.
The skater set his bag on the slightly-messy-but-otherwise-untouched twin bed that he'd been sitting on during his earlier 'education.' He stepped back to push the nearby night-stand out of the way, and then reached for the metal bed-frame under the mattress, pulling it back towards himself until a 3-foot gap had been established between the twins. That done, he turned around and sat on the edge of it, looking out through the corner windows to see the slow trickle of snowflakes starting to pass by outside. He turned his head slightly back over one shoulder, enough to establish that he was speaking to Minako and not just the room, "Maybe she'd feel better if she knew how much less likely I am to do something tonight than I was yesterday after the SP..." He admitted darkly.
"It makes me feel better...in a way..." Minako added, hanging up her jacket for the third time, "But in another, I kind of feel like we dodged a bullet, if that's how it is."
He nodded and leaned forward against his knees again, "Yesterday night, after Yuri caught me in the changing room... The fight we had, the things I said to him...by the time it entered my head to kiss him, I had partly resigned myself to the idea that I wouldn't be coming back anyway. I was pretty-well convinced that my last act on this earth would be to finally kiss the person I loved from...so far back. Knowing he would tell Viktor, and the fall-out I could expect from that...I didn't plan to be around for it."
"What changed your mind?"
He thought for a moment before shrugging and recoiling into himself a little, "It turns out...one-sided kisses are pretty awful." He explained quietly, "It started to sink in how I had to hold him down...hold him still, just so I could get what I wanted, and it started to eat me up. I didn't want to leave - this world, or this competition - without trying to tell him how sorry I was. Thinking about what I'd done from an outside perspective...and maybe it only hit me because time had passed, and I was thinking back on it after the fact..." He lifted his grey-brown eyes to the snow again, "The selfish urge I'd had before to take what I wanted...only to come to the sad realization that what I wanted was wasn't more important than what he wanted... I couldn't stand to think that my last act on this earth would be to do that sort of thing to someone I genuinely cared about. That's not me. That's not something I would ever do in my right mind." He turned slightly where he sat, bringing a knee up against the edge of the bed to look at the woman watching from behind him, "What I did can never be undone... So I want to do everything I can to prove to Yuri...to the both of them...that the person I really am is different from the monster I was in that moment. It doesn't just end with an apology. Words are just noises, after all. ...In martial arts, every action we do is merely primed with a sound, but if the action that follows is weak, then the noise uttered before that is worthless. The things that you and Viktor told me...prove that I have a lot of things to do before I can be a better person. The apology I give will merely prime the actions I take later on."
Minako's face was practically leaking from a comical rivers of tears flowing from her eyes, and she whimpered pitifully from her side of the room, "...Asahi..."
He blanched a little, "Ahhhhh...sorry...?"
She buried her eyes against the crook of one arm, "IwanttohugyouforthatbutIdon'tknowifyou'llletmeeeee..."
The skater gave a nervous half-smile, mostly out of uncertainty for it all, "Err...you...can if you want...?"
The emotional ballerina practically flew across the room, glomping down on him tightly, "You'regoingtobejustfine!"
.
Mikhail rolled his phone over in his hands, checking the screen every few turns for the incoming message he'd been waiting for. Though only Nikkita sat next to him where they'd returned to the stands, both Viktoria and Konstantin were staring at him from further down, each one wondering how much longer the man would have to be that way.
Ping~
His phone nearly launched out of his hands, but Mikhail grabbed it quickly and looked, seeing that merciful text from his lady love, [I'm back, I'm in bed, and I'm going to sleep. Wish Yura luck for me if he hasn't already gone out. I'll find a recording of it in the morning. Night hun.]
He slouched dramatically, nearly sliding off the end of his seat as he sighed loudly, but then pushed back up and typed his reply, [Ok great, and I will. Goodnight.]
Nikki shook her head at her father, but smiled anyway, returning to her own phone, [Okay he heard back, so he'll actually be able to watch you now.]
Yurio glowered at his phone from where he was sitting in the prep area, legs splayed out where he was stretching. The phone was face-up on his mat, but when he saw the message, he leaned down into a split with his elbows on the ground, and tippy-tapped a reply with just his fingertips, [I was mostly worried he'd cause another scene trying to get out of his seat again, but I guess it's cool if he actually watches me, too.]
[haha ikr?]
[Oh, maybe you'll be happy to know this, but...Yuri and Victor are watching a LiveStream of this event. They told me they'd watch through the medaling ceremony.]
Yurio raised his head a little bit as he read that note, but then simply huffed to himself as he started typing again.
[Yuratchka, it's almost your turn. Better get your skates on.] Yakov told him from nearby. Lilia was next to him, and they were both looking at a monitor of the current skater's show.
"Da." He answered, hitting Send and pushing up to sit normally.
In the audience, Nikki read the answer, and grinned mischievously before turning the screen dark to put her phone away.
.
While the much-anticipated final skater was being waited on, the Nikiforov household allowed themselves a few idle indulgences as they passed the time. While Viktor's left arm rested happily against his partner's chest, their fingers laced together there, their right hands were a bit more lively. Though moving slowly, they wove and turned their fingers around one another, gently caressing soft skin as they moved, barely touching. Each turn or change in angle offered new places for the other to find, fingertips gliding deftly over each gold band before moving off again, never completely stopping.
"Oh look, there he finally is-" Yuri saw, nudging his face towards the left side of the screen.
The skater in the rink was taking his final bow, moving off towards the kiss and cry, while Yurio was getting ready to take his place on the ice. His Team Russia jacket came off, and he took a quick swish of water while he listened quietly to some last-second advice from his coach and choreographer. He looked calm and ready.
[The score for Magnus Orlovis...167.25, with a total score of 253.91. He is in 12th place.]
The meager audience cheered, and the athlete returned to the prep area, leaving their last athlete on rink-side...who seemed to be making a phone-call for some reason.
[The final skater for the Russian National Championship Men's Singles Free Skate...representing the St. Petersburg Skate Club...Yuri...Plisetsky!]
Yuri's phone rung on the kotatsu, startling him enough to jump, but it wasn't a surprise to see whose name had come up as the person calling him.
On the television screen, Yurio had kicked off his blade guards and slipped onto the ice...still holding his phone.
Viktor just thought it was funny, laughing even as he suggested his partner answer.
Doing so, Yuri brought the phone up to his chest and set it to Speaker, "Hey."
"Hey katsudon. Word is, you and Viktor are watching right now." The teen quipped, "Any truth to that?"
"Might be some." Yuri teased, "Depends who's asking."
Out of nowhere, the blonde suddenly yelled at the entire audience, "Ugadajte kto s nami na linii!?" [Guess who's on the phone with us?]
"Oh he didn't," Yuri looked on in disbelief, "What are you doing!?"
The crowd seemed to catch on pretty quick, chanting Viktor, Viktor, Viktor...with the odd Viktuuri thrown in for good measure. Just as the fans had promised, they had their scoreboards out showing the pair's results from Japanese Nationals, and their corresponding medals.
"Ty absoljutno prav, èto Viktor i Yuri!" [That's exactly right, it's Viktor and Yuri!] Yurio confirmed, much to the audience's cheering, "Horošo, gde kamera?" [Okay, so where is the camera?] He asked then, mostly to the phone, and started pointing a finger around the audience, rotating slowly as he moved, "Tell me when."
"Uhhhh...more behind you..." Yuri answered, "Keep going, keep going...there! Just lower your hand a little bit...it's someone sitting straight ahead!"
"Ty!" [You!] Yurio barked, causing someone to suddenly shriek, "Egovy že ego glaza!" [You are his eyes!]
The LiveStream suddenly shuddered, and the camera flipped around, showing an extreme close-up of some frantic fan's face, [Holy shit Viktor and Yuri are on my Stream!? AHHH!]
Viktor whined sarcastically, "Tell the guy to put his camera back so we can see!"
"Rasslabʹsja, rasslabʹsja..." [Relax, relax...] Yurio called, then just laughed, pointing again at the LiveStreamer in the stands, "Udeljatʹ pristalʹnoe vnimanie. Užin, ona budet uvidetʹ moju pobedu." [Pay close attention. Tonight, they will watch me win Gold.]
The audience roared as well as it could, given its thin numbers, but the Russian Tiger seemed pleased either way. He quickly slid back to rink-side and handed off his phone, but no sooner did that happen, that the audience started calling out their well-wishes for Viktor's troubled ankle.
Yakov heard it rather quickly, and his brow furrowed under his hat's brim, [Yuratchka, what are they talking about? What's wrong with Vitya's ankle?]
[He slipped, like the dumbass he is. Stepped onto the ice with his blade-guards still on.]
[I see.]
Yurio looked on for another half second...before realizing that he should run, and fled across the ice towards center.
"VIKTOR NIKIFOROV I TOLD YOU TO BE MORE CAREFUL WITH YOUR DAMN LEGS! YOU DIDN'T LISTEN TO ME ALL THIS SEASON WITH YOUR 'EVOKE' PROGRAM AND NOW YOU CAN'T SKATE!? IDIOT!"
Both Yuri and Viktor were blasted back against the couch to hear the elder coach's consternation.