He wonders what it must feel like to feel as remote as the sea. As the birds wheeling overhead.
To never have to feel the kind of weight that settles on his ribs when Victor says that this reminds him of home every single morning. This home Yuri's almost never heard him speak of and hasn't asked about, and it must be the perfect opening. The home he never thought he'd leave, and the things he missed from it now that it was gone, that he's remembered and missed every morning.
The one he was going to return to now.
Yuri hears the question but it's not what happens to it, when it bounces around inside of him with the other words. Because this may be the one and only chance he even has to explain. What went wrong. Why it did. That this isn't Victor's fault, any more than it's never been anyone else. When what that makes him think of is the people who've tried to help when it got to the worst.
The ones that had understood, few and far between, and the worst moments, when it really showed, and he doesn't even know if he'll be able to explain it right when he starts talking. Gaze somewhere between his knees and the sand and the sea, but looking through all of them, back to that day. To someone else who hadn't understood, and kept trying to blunder right into it. Even well meant.
"There was a girl in Detroit who was really pushy and kept talking to me." All of the time, but it hadn't seemed like such a big deal. Something manageable. Avoidable. Defendable, until he just didn't have it let in him that one day. "One time, a rink mate got hurt in an accident. I was pretty torn up with worry..." Waiting, and waiting, and waiting, trying to not let the waiting get to him, even as it did. Like it always did. "I was in the hospital waiting with that girl."
"When she hugged me to comfort me--" It had all gone sideways, and there wasn't anything left. Not to both hold himself, and the weight of everything, even her sympathy, then, on top of him, too. "--I shoved her out of the way without thinking about it."
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To never have to feel the kind of weight that settles on his ribs when Victor says that this reminds him of home every single morning. This home Yuri's almost never heard him speak of and hasn't asked about, and it must be the perfect opening. The home he never thought he'd leave, and the things he missed from it now that it was gone, that he's remembered and missed every morning.
The one he was going to return to now.
Yuri hears the question but it's not what happens to it, when it bounces around inside of him with the other words. Because this may be the one and only chance he even has to explain. What went wrong. Why it did. That this isn't Victor's fault, any more than it's never been anyone else. When what that makes him think of is the people who've tried to help when it got to the worst.
The ones that had understood, few and far between, and the worst moments, when it really showed, and he doesn't even know if he'll be able to explain it right when he starts talking. Gaze somewhere between his knees and the sand and the sea, but looking through all of them, back to that day. To someone else who hadn't understood, and kept trying to blunder right into it. Even well meant.
"There was a girl in Detroit who was really pushy and kept talking to me." All of the time, but it hadn't seemed like such a big deal. Something manageable. Avoidable. Defendable, until he just didn't have it let in him that one day. "One time, a rink mate got hurt in an accident. I was pretty torn up with worry..." Waiting, and waiting, and waiting, trying to not let the waiting get to him, even as it did. Like it always did. "I was in the hospital waiting with that girl."
"When she hugged me to comfort me--" It had all gone sideways, and there wasn't anything left. Not to both hold himself, and the weight of everything, even her sympathy, then, on top of him, too. "--I shoved her out of the way without thinking about it."