9 - 10 December, 2014 - Barcelona

[fivetimechamp]

There's a swift, fleeting moment, between his toes breaking the water's surface and the waves he'd created closing over his head, where he imagines himself on vacation. On a break from the hectic stresses and mundanity of everyday life, floating high above a sea of lights. Free to be himself, to relax. To lose himself in those self-indulgent fantasies only possible when daily training and errands, practice and diet, aren't demanding every second of his undivided attention.

He floats on his back, spread-eagled in the water, letting it buoy him, letting his thoughts trickle along whatever path they most wish to take –– which, these days, means they wander along a well-worn path from sleepless nights and newly-opened gates. Life and love –– two words he's neglected for over twenty years, that suddenly knock at the door of every thought, nudging him further down the path before he even recognizes he's headed that direction. 

Whispering, for the first time, in glimpses and sidelong glances, of a tomorrow past today.



"Ah-choo!"

A sneeze brings him out of tantalizing reverie, and he sinks further into the water to sniffle, the moment broken. It turns out even Barcelona's cold in December –– not the bone-deep freeze of St. Petersburg or Moscow, a thin wind biting through coats and scarves and jumpers with ease, but still probably a little cool to be lazing in a rooftop pool, here at the official hotel for the Grand Prix Final. Still, it's peaceful up here, and the water is heated even if the air isn't, and he has no place special to be. Yuri is still sleeping off his jetlag –– that's why they got here early to begin with. They have all of tomorrow to practice and acclimate before the Final begins. 

Steps, and the gentle tinkling of crystal against glass, distract him before the words even come, but then, Chris is a prodigy of distraction. He's made it into an art form.

"I thought, other than me, only a Russian would be stupid enough to get in the pool this time of year." That robe is scandalously short, and Victor allows himself an amused moment of picturing Chris, and the accompanying distress, at the baths at Yu-topia. "I guess I was right."

And dark glasses, even at night. Victor can't hide his amusement. "Chris!"

"Hi, Coach Victor." From anyone else, that tends to sound like an insult, but from Chris it only feels like a fond nickname. They've known each other too long and too well to stand on ceremony, so Chris' complaint that Victor is in the way of his skinny dipping rolls right off Victor's back like water droplets. 

"Don't let me stop you. I'll even take photos for you."

It wouldn't be the first time.

And just like that, the illusion of a vacation is over, drowned and smothered by the dozens of photos Victor finds himself taking of Chris mugging for the camera like he was born to do it. Sometimes it's difficult to remember that this sex bomb was once an angelic-looking little boy with golden curls, the sort Victor could picture most clearly skipping through a Swiss meadow full of flowers, but Chris has become a force to reckon with in his own right. 

He can't imagine a skating season without Chris. They've shared the podium so many times it's almost begun to feel like tradition. 

But then, it's already been eight months since he came to Hasetsu, too. How much time does it really take to change the things that can't be imagined?

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[theglassheart]

No. No. No, no. He is not tired.

And it feels almost like a slap to hear it put out there like that. With Victor standing there, his scarf and the fringe of his hair ruffling in the winter breeze, and that peerless hollow smile of acceptance. Like Yuri must have forgotten because he's tired, and incapable of getting anything right once that happens and because he's tired they will close everything down on this dot, because Yuri can't manage anything.

Because Yuri can't ever manage to get anything just right (and would this be any different).
It stings more than it hurts, though it is both, and Yuri frowns, words pushing themselves up fast.
An accusation, for an accusation. "You don't have to say it like that."

It can't end here. It can't. He hadn't even decided.

He hadn't found the right thing.

[fivetimechamp]

"Well, I'm tired."

He is. In his bones. Muscles. Head. Spirit.

(How many years has it been?

How many months since then?)



It's been a long day (eight months, two years) and he can feel it tugging at him, like Maccachin's teeth in the hem of his coat. Yuri might not want to admit defeat -- and he never does -- but Victor can take that for him. He can take a little more.

"But..."

He always relents so quickly. They should go back, and Yuri should get a good night's sleep, and he should focus on their plan of attack –– but what is there really left to do tonight? And Yuri looks crushed at the thought of leaving already, of returning to their world, of shattering this brief, make-believe vacation.

Victor can carry a little more, but he can't take this. Not when it's such an easy fix. "If you want to walk a little more, I'd like that, too. Let's forget about the nuts. The Christmas markets are right over there, why don't we go take a look, while we're right here?"

[theglassheart]

There's another snap of tension at Victor's words. Interverting like a next excuse, that Yuri nearly stumbles into the words of calling him on, except then Victor says that one word right after them and Yuri's lips press. Holding back those words, and a sudden desperate bubble of necessity expanding to crack his ribs from inside. No space even for taking or letting of a single part of a breath. For anything. Anything that he can get now.

Which makes the whole of his body feel shaky as he's nodding, possibly a little too fast, at Victor's suggestion.

Relief is more draining than buoying, and the whole of it feels like it has a time limit. From one day and so many hours, and so many places, across the whole city, to figure this all out, now down to possibly less than one and only the space of the Market, for whatever that encompassed. He would have to figure it out. Figure all of this out. Not fail at it again. One more chance.

Nothing had been enough, nothing had ... meant what he wanted to say, and he didn't have even the smallest clue about how to say any of it in words. There was simply that feeling of being unmoored while the time clock ticked louder, even as he nodded, and said, quietly, turning toward all the new noise was coming from. "Okay."

[fivetimechamp]

In the end, they walked in silence through the Fira de Santa Llúcia, watching the streams of people wandering by as night falls in earnest. To stave off the chill in the air, Victor buys a cup of spiced wine to sip.

It tastes like Christmas.

Slowly, Yuri relaxes a little further beside him, until the silence they walk in feels less oppressive and more thoughtful, companionable. Soon enough the clock with strike twelve and Cinderella will have to go back to the hotel to try and sleep before tomorrow's short program, but for now, they can enjoy the fairytale lights and shops around them, the air scented with cinnamon and the faint promise of snow, somewhere in the world.

It's so close to being a perfect night that he honestly isn't sure how he'll have it in him to tell Yuri when it's over...

But they'll have to have dinner first, at least, surely. Perhaps he was getting a little ahead of himself, earlier.

[theglassheart]

The market is thronged by people and if the stores they'd seen this day before now had window displays and seasonal sales, here, you cannot look without finding a plethora more of it here. The trees fairly drip with the light thrown from hanging displays, and the strings of light bedecking every solid surface line of every stall and tent belonging to the artisans and vendors.

The sections of it are simple enough to tell apart, even if Yuri feels too distracted to focus on the nativity scenes of all sizes, or the truly look very close at the lucky greenery and instruments when they pass them. It's when they make it to an area laid out of artisan shops more than the others, that he starts looking over the displays a little more quickly. A quickening starting to strum up from the middle of his chest. Or, maybe, it's his stomach. Another chance.

Maybe, the last chance if Victor's words about heading back are barely in check.

"Victor, your birthday is Christmas Day, right?" Maybe maybe is right, when Victor's first response is so subdued and withheld. It only makes Yuri need to push more, need to ask, in case there might be something specific. "What would you like for your gift?"

Victor was sometimes. Specific. Flighty, too, at turns, and the bags in Yuri's hand already spoke to Victor buying whatever he wanted. At the drop of hat, both because he might need it or even just on the occasion of simply wanting something. But there had to be something. Something Yuri could find. Something that would fit. Something that would mean ... everything. Everything it had to. Yuri needed it to.

[fivetimechamp]

"Hmm..."

He sips at his wine, looking up at the stars and the twinkling lights above them as he picks the right way to phrase this answer. "In Russia we don't normally celebrate before the actual birthday."

Or even on the birthday, itself. More often the celebrations are saved for name days. He hadn't even considered that he might want something for his birthday, unless that something is for Yuri to win the Grand Prix Final, and let Victor stay with him forever.

...Not that that wsa what Yuri meant. "We don't really celebrate Christmas, either."

And Yuri shouldn't be spending money on him. Victor has plenty, surely: fine clothing and accessories Yuri could never afford at his current sponsorship level. An apartment he hasn't seen in months. His skates. Maccachin. His tiny room at Yu-topia.

He really doesn't need anything more than what he's got right now.

[theglassheart]

As Victor shot out one idea and, then, quick as it could even appear to be desperately grabbed at, the second, Yuri felt his stomach only tighten as his shoulders tried their hardest to deflate on him. He did his best not to let his posture cave inward under his coat even as he looked away. No Birthday present. No Christmas present. Suddenly, neither of them was appropriate, without overstepping and deliberately ignoring Victor's own culture.

His eyes turning down from Victor and the shops beyond them on either side, toward his shoes. "I see."
Time was sliding away like sand through his fingers and each grasped idea with it.

But that couldn't be the end. Could it? No. No. It couldn't. It couldn't to be.


There had to be something. Someway. That he could find. Do.