Yuuri felt a thrill from just skating on the same ice as Victor. Somehow even just seeing him out of the corner of her eye as she skated left her feeling excited. She wasn't sure how she was going to handle actually skating with him, but she was going to find out very quickly.

She was a little surprised to see just Yakov Feltsman at the side of the rink, because hadn't Angela said that there would be a specialized pairs coach to teach them what they needed to know? She knew that the best of Russia trained at this rink; surely there was at least one pairs coach? Yuuri didn't really care; just getting the chance to work with such an accomplished coach was making her feel very nervous.

Yuuri scrambled to follow Victor's lead as he skated over to where his coach waited. Yakov stared at her, sizing her up without preamble. Yuuri felt fear wash over her, but he soon turned away.

"Skate Stammi Vicino for us," he barked at her. Just like that? With no other advice or instruction, he wanted her to go just straight into the routine. She didn't have time to overanalyze it because Yakov was already heading towards the office with an mp3 player in his hand. Victor caught her eye and gave her an encouraging smile. The butterflies in her stomach weren't from nerves anymore, and she felt like she was on top of the world. Victor seemed excited for her to skate his program, so she'd do it. And she'd do it well.

She felt oddly at ease when she started to skate, each move filled with determination to prove herself worthy. The first steps of the song were her favorite, because they focused so much on showing the emotion, the longing, that the skater had. She tried her best to preserve that desperate searching in the enticing arm movements and seemingly lazy spins that made up the song's opening. When she came to the first jump, she made the split second decision not to downgrade the jump. Yuuri gritted her teeth as she took off into a quad toe loop, closing her eyes and preparing for a rough landing. Trying a quad wasn't a good idea; she had landed a quad only one other time in her life out of many attempts in practice, so what made her think that she would be able to do it now, when it mattered the most to her?

Yuuri dug deep to find the strength in her core, praying that all the work she had done to improve her balance would pay off and let her stay on her feet,. Her hand brushed the ice as she landed, but she hadn't fallen. She nearly stopped in shock, but her body kept going on autopilot, caught up in the song. When the next jump came, her legs felt like gelatin. She focused as much as she could on technique in a triple flip. She wobbled on landing, but was overjoyed to achieve the full amount of rotations. Yuuri felt herself begin to tire, even with her incredible stamina. Victor's program was front-loaded with difficult jumps, and was designed to challenge a ridiculously fit male skater. Yuuri could skate far longer than other female skaters, but in competitions, her programs didn't place a demand this great upon her. She continued to ignore the signals that her muscles were sending her, even though she knew she'd be sore tomorrow because of this.

By the time the music was finally over, Yuuri struggled to even hold the ending pose. After a few seconds that seemingly took more willpower to withstand than her successful quad jump earlier, she broke the pose and bent over, panting. That had taken so much out of her. The rest of the day might be a challenge.

But somehow, Yuuri didn't mind the feeling of dead tiredness that lingered in her bones. The ability to do that routine had been earned through pain; the price of beauty in the figure skating world was hours of suffering, all for a few minutes where the judges coldly ripped you apart. When she had regained some of her breath, she turned back and tried her best to drag herself over to Victor and Yakov. Both men simply stared at her. Yuuri worried. What had she done wrong? Probably flubbed a jump or something like that. Technicalities had never been her strong suit.

What she wasn't expecting was for Victor to launch himself at her, all the while muttering excitedly in Russian. Yuuri stiffened as he suddenly wrapped her in a tight hug, leaving her no room for escape. Victor released her after a long moment when his mind caught up with what he had done. His hand flew to the back of his neck, and he gestured apologetically.

"Sorry if that was too forward of me, but that was absolutely amazing! What a beautiful story. Plus you landed a quad jump!" Victor's sudden shyness disappeared quickly as he grew more and more excited. Yuuri blushed at the praise. Yakov cleared his voice, and the pair turned around to face him. Yuuri smiled widely at him, unable to hide the good mood that she was in.

He looked appraisingly at Yuuri, approval in his eyes.

"I do not think that we need to work more on this currently. Good work."

Unfortunately the energy that the praise had given Yuuri was quick to fade as she and Victor began to work on individual technique. The goal here was to try to mimic each other's technique and timing to prepare for skating together. Yakov had a lot to say about her jumps now that she was tired and making mistakes, which Yuuri appreciated in theory. It was great to work with a world-renowned coach and she was sure that he was helping her, but it meant that Yuuri frequently didn't meet his expectations in practice. Plus, it was hardly fair to expect her to match Victor jump for jump after a program like she had just skated. Just as this was beginning to grate on her, the focus of practice shifted to spins and footwork sequences, and Yuuri had room to breathe again. Apparently her footwork was more than passable (and if she dared to think it, better than Victor's). Yuuri nodded when she was told this; it wasn't anything she didn't know before. Her programs were choreographed to reflect this after all, with a greater focus on good presentation than difficulty, though of course her routines had to be difficult enough to win.

They finally got a break to get something to eat around noon, and Yuuri couldn't have been happier. By skating so intensely at the beginning of practice, she had wanted nothing more than a break or food ever since. She was thankful for her stamina, but in order to maintain that fitness, it took days like these, with few breaks and lots of hard work. Yuuri took off her skates and dried the blades, placing them carefully back into her bag. She grabbed her things and walked out the rink doors, towards where she had seen a coffee shop earlier. Maybe she could get a sandwich there?

She found the café easily enough, but was disheartened to see the menus were written entirely in the undecipherable Cyrillic alphabet. She tried to speak to the staff, but from the confused looks she got, none of them spoke English. Yuuri opened the door to turn and go, slamming into someone on the other side. She apologized profusely to the man in the red warmup suit, belatedly realizing that it was Victor. He smiled at her.

"No problem. I should have been looking where I was going." Yuuri made to continue on her way, but he looked at her curiously.

"Did you already get something to eat here? I left the rink not far behind you. They must have excellent service."

Yuuri wasn't sure if it was possible for her to get redder than she was now, but her face certainly seemed willing to try as she explained her predicament.

"Actually, I was going to try to find somewhere to eat where the staff spoke English, because my grasp of Russian is nonexistent. I have no idea what anything on the menu is."

Victor lit up and started chattering before Yuuri knew what was happening. Contrary to the suave image he presented to the public, he was excitable and almost hyperactive.

"Don't worry, I'll help translate! It's the least that I can do after you came all the way to St. Petersberg."

Yuuri's first instinct was to protest this generosity, but her stomach quickly decided to accept his help. She smiled gratefully and sat down at a table. Yuuri wasn't sure why she felt so surprised when Victor slid into the seat across from her (he had said he would help her after all) but it made her feel strangely warm inside.

Victor looked at the menu on the boards and began reading out the options.

"Um, Victor? That all sounds very good, but I don't really know anything about Russian food. What would you recommend that I get?"

"I think that you would like pirozhki! It's a bun with a filling inside- they are kind of like a sandwich? There are sandwiches here too, but I think that you will like it."

Yuuri shrugged.

"Sounds good to me!"

Victor went up to the counter and ordered for her. Yuuri listened carefully even though she had no idea what was being said. Even though he was probably just talking about food, his voice caused Yuuri to flush again. Why did his voice have to sound so sexy? She sat across from him as they waited for their food, unsure of what to say. Yuuri caught herself staring at Victor. She made eye contact with him several times, quick to look away each time. His eyes seemed teasing, laughing at her every time she looked away and inviting her to continue to stare into them.

Victor pulled out his phone and she contemplated doing the same so that she wouldn't feel so out of place, but she was surprised when he handed his phone to her. She noted absently that his phone case looked like his free skate costume.

"I took a video when you skated the routine earlier, if you want to see?"

Yuuri hit play, curious about how she had looked. She was taken aback by the Yuuri she saw in the video; could that really be her? Her jumps were some of the best they'd and the quad looked somehow easy, even though she knew from her aching muscles that it hadn't been. More importantly, there was a layer to her emotional interpretation that hadn't ever been there before with this program. She tried her best to analyze it, but couldn't put a finger on what it was. She paused for a moment when the video ended before handing it back to Victor.

"I can send it to you if you'd like. What's your number?"

Yuuri nearly started hyperventilating, even though she knew realistically it was nothing she should be getting so worked up about. He had made that request seem so casual. He obviously had plenty of girls' numbers. She still put her number in his contacts though, and smiled when she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. Maybe she'd send it to Phichit later.

Yuuri was both disappointed and glad when their food arrived. The two of them devoured their meal very quickly, and no words were exchanged. The pirozhki were delicious, just like Victor had promised. Even without talking to him (and she found that Victor made talking easy, even for someone as shy as she was), she liked just being around him, because it was so different than what she had been expecting. From his attitude in practice (strangely lazy and filled with distractions and chatting, but somehow yielding excellent results) to lending her his skill with the Russian language, he managed to surprise her. She recalled an interview from when he was younger where he said that his goal in skating was to surprise the audience.

Yuuri had never really been one for surprises before, but she found that she was coming to enjoy them.