GPF Banquet, 9 December, 2012 – Sochi, Russia

[fivetimechamp]

He's never quite sure how long he should stay at these things.

It's not that he doesn't enjoy the banquet – he does. After winning his fifth consecutive Grand Prix Final, the champagne tastes all the brighter, and the company around him is more delightful than ever. He enjoys seeing his peers and companions, sharply-dressed and relaxed for the first time in months, the strain of competition dropping away, even if only for a single evening. The food is tasty, the attention warming, the evening sparkling, the room filled with all the brightest stars of their world. Yes, he enjoys the banquet.

But there's a part of him that itches to make his excuses, and leave. To trade out this suit for a loose part of pants and a warm shirt; these polished shoes for the clean glide of his skates.

He can make the program even better. He can perfect it.

So there's an element here, too, of detachment. He notices it with the others, too – with Chris, who fell short of him, again, and JJ, full of boundless confidence. Eventually abandoning polite small talk and gossip to dig into their craft, to discuss music selections and jump compositions, to compliment and rag on each other. No one used to being off the ice for long.

He talks less, but thinks more. Already working through the choreography in his head, even as he laughs over champagne, and greets his friends.

It is who he is. The champion. And tomorrow will be more of the same.

Comments

[theglassheart]

Victor is glorious like this.

A million pictures -- his pictures, somewhere, he can't remember where, even what they are -- could not do this justice.

The brilliant vibrancy of those laughing eyes, when everything stops. Every crenellation of an ocean right below him. The color in his cheeks, that Yuri isn't sure when got there. When it got there, or they did. Both of them racing for a summit they got to together, twined up like this. Seconds ago feels like years. Minutes an eternity to remember. The wrong time, and definitely not the right place to be living when Victor's fingers cradle his cheek in return. Warm and soft and gentle, a brush of fingertips, and fingers, and palm, he thinks he can feel all the way to the soles of his feet, thunders in his ears to the same roar of the crowd.

A thousand muscles straining, and something else. Somewhere else. Pushing, swirling, getting everywhere.

In Yuri's eyes, in his teeth, when it would be easier than anything, to just lean down toward him, even the momentary wash of the thought of just letting his hands fall and catch around Victor's back, his waist, even if they fell, while they're both laughing and gasping, not exactly closing as pristinely as they could be, and neither of them seeming to care at all. Caught up in even that together, and he can't remember if he's ever seen Victor look like .. this. Even on a podium. Even the very first time.

There's nothing pristine and perfectly unwrinkled. More toward just wamed up than to needing to stop.

It's heady and sharp, sparkling everywhere when those fingers lift from his cheek and that laughing mouth says up, up, like a wake up from a drowning daze of everything before his eyes, and Yuri goes, pulling Victor's body up with him. Giving him back to himself, and feeling the slack in his muscles from the disappearing weight of balancing two bodies as something distant, barely connected to his own body as it releases. Slingshots somewhere else, as Victor's fingers clasp his and drag his hand and the arm attached to it upward suddenly.

Making Yuri laugh again. Broad, warm amusement at Victor's dragging it right back to a show that still hasn't ended. At the rise and fall of those shoulders still gathering air, and that smile that Victor seems to have frozen onto himself. Even if frozen it wrong, it's like that smile could melt the whole of a country in hard winter. That he has to stop looking at to bow, before coming up again, making himself focus on those people closest, cheering, jumping.

Even the kid from earlier looked stunned, for just over a second, before realizing Yuri was looking at him and scowled disgusted.

[fivetimechamp]

Around them, people laugh and clap and cheer, and Victor soaks it up, like he always does, but this time, not alone. Drawing Yuri's hand in front of his chest, before dropping it as he takes the other, stepping smoothly behind him and turning them, to acknowledge the appreciation from the other end of the room, and he loves this.

This, the applause.

This, Yuri's hand in his.

This, the thundering of his heart, and the ragged edge to his breath, and the sweat on his forehead, and the way it feels like he could dance on air, if they started again.

(How much he wants to start again.)

But not as much as he wants to see what happens next, now that Yuri demanded and he willingly capitulated. Now that he's been seduced, now that all he wants is to find that feeling from the dance floor, and see how it feels pushed up against a wall.

(That's how this goes, isn't it? If Chris is to be believed? He never – doesn't – but neither of those are words for tonight.)

Stepping to the side, to put his hand at Yuri's waist, arm around his back, while his other hand comes to the front of Yuri's other shoulder and leaves him in a sort of half-embrace, as he starts to navigate them off the floor, leaning close to speak into his ear.

Still laughing. Still breathless. Still brilliant, and wanting more. "Come on, Yuri."

Bulletproof in his certainty. Yuri reached for him. Pulled him into the pas de deux. Yuri wants him.


And he wants. Oh, he wants.

"I need some water. Let's get some."

At the edge of the room, where the water dispensers are.

Which are conveniently close to the doors to the hall.

Which is conveniently empty.

Which is exactly what Victor wants, right now. Because as much as he loves this crowd, and this rush, and being the entertainer, he wants this, more.

[theglassheart]

He focuses on the crowd, on the lights and the forms, unable to entirely tell where everything stops and starts. Well enough, but not perfectly. Even without his glasses, he knows it's not entirely that. That his breath is still coming hard and he pressed into his toes, trying to align with stillness and his own weight in a way that movement, and the most intricate of dance steps had not even phased him in the slightest.

Which was working for the half second before suddenly Victor leaned right back into him. One arm finding its way to his waist, and the other to his shoulder, and he's suddenly being escorted some steps toward the edge of the dancefloor. But he can't even focus on that, the momentary inability to handle his feet existing at all, when Victor's breath is warm on his ear, tickling the skin, shifting his hair, and his own name is being laughed, breathless in his ear.

Catching hard in his chest, making a hand shoot up and anchor on Victor's, right over his chest, just in reaction.
Makes him push back and in, against Victors side, the reverse of where he'd been what felt like seconds ago.

When he's looking up, at Victor looking down and out. Like he's won something better than gold, and it's alive in Yuri's skin. Even as he asks for water with a looking that's almost too calculating -- maybe even the tiniest touch unfocused, himself, and focused on something even harder for it, something across the room, that Yuri isn't quite sure what is, given the distance, the blur ... and it mostly looking empty.

At least it was before a body was suddenly blocking them. From what felt like nowhere.
Yuri wasn't positive anyone should be able to move that fast, even as he was blinking upward.

"Where do you think you're going?" There's a moment of confusion as Yuri realizes Chris is actually addressing him. "You don't think you're done already, do you?" It's something like an accusation, made of towering sinewy height, wrapped inside a laugh, and something ... almost like purring? It's overwhelmingly something, that leaves Yuri blinking and, even though his spine straightens, and he wavers forward slightly toward it.

Especially when, without missing a beat, Chris was suddenly looking to Victor, raising two fists, with new champagne bottles in them and whisper bright smiles of promise. "We found these while you were busy, too."

Yuri perked up, the hand at Victor's arm releasing to slap at the jacketed arm there, as he twists back with a ruthless peerless smile of someone who had won the lottery, granting it to Victor with ease of a breath. "More champagne. You're saved!" He threw that smile at Chris, as he looked back and held out a hand. "Arigatou!"

[fivetimechamp]

Everything is working perfectly, for a moment: Yuri stutters, but his hand comes up and catches over Victor's, making Victor's heart do a strange somersault in his chest, and there's a second where he leans his weight into Victor's side, his chest.

Smaller than him, but wiry and strong. Fitting perfectly, right here, in the broken circle of his arms.




He can see it, clearly. What will happen. The weight of the door against his hip, and the soft click as it shuts, before it melts into silence, stillness.

Before they're alone. And he can find out what it feels like when everything they just danced blooms into reality.

Those steps, those touches, feeling more intimate than a kiss, but he'd put that to the test. Waving away any thoughts of how little they know each other, how these might be the most words he's ever even spoken to Katsuki Yuri.

He doesn't care. He'll be happy to spend the whole night long talking, as long as he can have it. Everything that was just offered, and promised, and accepted.



Lost in pleasant thoughts, of how satisfying the sound of Yuri's back hitting the hallway wall will be, when his own chest bumps against it, and he looks up in confusion, to see Chris, smiling. But not smiling.

Predatory.


A grip of annoyance in his gut, that's tripped up by the way Yuri smacks at his hand, and Victor releases him, taking a surprised step back, hands suddenly empty, the space in his arms suddenly vacated, while looking from Yuri to Chris, to the champagne bottle, and back. "I don't –"

He doesn't want champagne. At least, not here, and not now.

Maybe later. In a hotel room. Ordered and brought in a bucket of ice, potentially with strawberries, but not here, when Chris is giving him a triumphant, sly look, that has Victor's expression flattening in exasperation as his hands fall to his side, annoyed and feeling too empy. "Chris – !"

[theglassheart]

"Victor."

He's handing over one of the two new bottles to Yuri's outstretched hand (the one that isn't his, because it's already opened, but full and maybe he looks back, toward the too large crowd and it sloshes in his vision, uncertain where that one went, whether he finished it, or someone has it, a person or a table), but he's lifting it for a drink. Ice cold, still sweating, glass against heated fingers, lips, a parched throat, all the same, as the Chris replies.

It's. There's. Something. In that smile. Triumphant. But that isn't it.

Like there's a conversation he's not involved in. Over his head.

That makes Yuri's brow twitch, a furrowing between them, at the top of his nose, for the blink of a moment, before he pulls the bottle back down and away, because he doesn't want to be left out of anything again. Not anymore. He's shown them already, twice, and he'll keep doing it, if he has to, and he interrupts instead, "Was that a challenge?"

It has none of the aggressive forthrightness of the way it had started with Victor. In his face. A need to prove himself, hot off the press from his junior competitor. There's still a rise of color all across the rise of Yuri's cheeks, and even his nose. A soft crimson that has everything to do with exertion and nothing to do with distaste.

His voice this time, in that question, is all silken vibrato. Just this side of not quite having fully caught his breath, but still all confident nonchalance, as he tilted his head considering another of his companion-competitors. Green eyes and blonde hair and even more of a need to look up. But Yuri refuses shifting back from his poised lean-in. Not even when Chris laughs first. His eyes leaving Victor, and coming back again.

Yuri held out the bottle to Victor, even without looking to him, because more than anything he's ready for the answer (even if some small, drowning, voice says he should have handed it over to Victor first, because of what he said, and then himself, but it doesn't matter, it's already done). Not when Chris looks beyond their shoulders, and the small space between them, to the area they'd left, to Victor again, something sharp and sweet, in cutting heat, made his eyes shine even more by the time they made back, again.

"It is a pity they don't have a real dance floor here. My specialty--" That word blurs in Yuri's hearing, and he's not sure how, it's like it doubles, triples. Is too long. Too warm. Too. Insulting. Implying. Inviting. "--is not in ballroom."

He takes the bait, even with a pressed his mouth, at the cat and mouse non-answer, demanding clarity. "Which is?"

[fivetimechamp]

He understands it, even as it annoys him, somewhere beneath the light-hearted laugh he gives as he accepts the bottle of champagne from Yuri without drinking from it, and his other hand lands on Yuri's shoulder.

Less claiming, more friendly.

(Or maybe a little of both.)

But he does understand it. This look on Chris' face. It's the same look he gets when he's trailing Victor after the short programs, and is determined to catch up and beat him during the free skate – even if he never has (and, Victor is smugly, shruggingly certain, never will). This expression that says this competition isn't over until he gets a turn.

Except it is. Should be. Victor never loses, and certainly not to Chris, and anyway, Chris should understand, too, shouldn't he?

Isn't he the one always finding someone, or someones, at these things, and disappearing with a bottle of champagne to find a place with fewer people and fewer clothes?

(Except, even more annoyingly, he thinks Chris does understand.


It's extremely vexing.)

But his laugh is light, and cheerful, and his shoulders are relaxed, because he has no intention of letting Chris get to him. "Pole."

He's seen it. Many of the skaters here have. And most of them know it, too: excellent core workouts, focusing on grace and control and the denial of gravity, and Chris, of course, excels at it. But...

Hand coming off Yuri's shoulder, and the other lifting the bottle, in a light and breezy shrug. "Where would you find one of those at a place like this?"

[theglassheart]

"Pole?" It's a faintly slurred word of confusion, looking back toward Victor and the hand that's suddenly appeared on his shoulder. Not certain when it got there at all, only that it goes floating away, with Victor's light, laugh. The one that sparkles in the air. In the actual air. Getting around Victor in the lights crowning his light hair. Cut. The fresh feeling of it brushing his cheek, tangling with his own.

That laughter all tender pleasure at stealing the last word, and flying off with it. His hand like a bird, taking off, again, already.

Even as something is clicking, slotting, in the back of his mind. His mouth giving an -- "Oh," of realization.

A dozen pictures, scattered throughout months (and years, really), of Chris caught in various poses, all lean muscle, with dripping sweat and those luminous (filtered) eyes, and there's a knot trying to rise somewhere in the back of Yuri's mind. But he doesn't want it. Like he's not sure he wanted Victor's hand to think it was allowed to go anywhere. Or for Victor to go on holding the champagne bottle like it's a flag he's not waving.

Especially when he asks that question, as though he's in agreement.
It's to Yuri's loss that there's no way to take this up. Prove this as well.

"They must have something here," Yuri says, undeterred. About the grand hotel.

Refusing to be given something he can't at least attempt. He will not be played with and for. Not tonight. Not again. Not after that Russian Kid (....that's not the right name, something is wrong, left footed, off balance, no glide, not the right feeling), and then Victor. All hard lines, and then soft folding. He hadn't dropped yet. Hadn't let anything slip.

"Have you asked?" Rolls off Yuri's tongue, as though it's as simple as that. Because it is, isn't it? They are the people playing for the. Paying for this room. For perfect golden light, and sparkling champagne like a fountain. For the forgotten quiet, elegance. "Ask."

If Chris looks anything it's even more intrigued. It's. It's even more than that. It's sparking considering, barely there flicker of surprise, like a one-third second of consideration that becomes a sudden roaring bonfire. A hand flying out, and one finger pointing at him. Determined and determining. "Don't go anywhere."

Yuri's mouth tugs toward a frown, like he'd been accused, like he was going to vanish, even as his response is fast, a little tottering even in the definitive. "I'm not running away."

[fivetimechamp]

He's losing count of the number of times Yuri has surprised him tonight, but this is another to add to that list: his own hand dropping, as he blinks, and while Chris looks taken aback, before his natural curiosity takes over, and he leaves them pinned there with a pointing finger, ordering them – well, Yuri – to not go anywhere.

Which Victor isn't at all sure he likes. Chris shouldn't get to have a say in whether Yuri stays or leaves, and he shouldn't be vying for his attention, when.


Watching Chris make his way back towards the DJ's table, before he looks back over at Yuri, so near his shoulder and looking as determined as if he's taking another shot at the gold, and Victor isn't used to this. Having to try for someone's attention. Wanting to steal it. Needing to order that spotlight back on him.

Where was this earlier?

He wants to ask where Yuri learned to dance that way. How he learned pairs moves, when he's always skated alone, and never seemed to have a close friend or peer to practice with. How someone as shy as he usually is could demand a competition on the pole with Christophe Giacometti, the seductress of their world.

Wants to grab Yuri's arm, and drag him away, distract him with his smile and hands and mouth and laughter. Wants to drown in a flood of finding out everything he can about him, after years of knowing next to nothing.

Settling for setting his hand at the small of Yuri's back, and tipping his head as winsomely as he's ever known how to do, the way that usually has cameras flashing and fans screaming. "Yuri..."

"You're leaving me already?" His smile coaxing and confident, and winning.

"How cruel."

[theglassheart]

Chris walks, no, that's the wrong word again. Not stalks either. It's not a glide even. It's this roll of hips, and sway of them, the hold of his spine and shoulders, loose, and silky, sensous, like a prowl, even in a powerfully fast stride. A completely different way of moving. The completely different way he skates. An uncertain warmth and realization catching up with Yuri. Where he's going. Why. Why so determined.

Because of him. Because of those words. Why had he sai--

There's suddenly a shadow on his face. A hand on his back, and he looks up into pale creamy skin, and impossible bright eyes, and the silver-grey hair that run its fingers over the right side of those eyes, like a half mask. Everything is slipping, sliding, gliding away from him. Colors. Division between shapes and distance.

No part of his body left except where those fingers press into him, a message he can't quite hear, because he can't hear anything. The world. The room. The music. The crowd. There's nothing but that silver voice and the way those lips fold over his name, when he's memerized, hynotized, eyes on those lips as more words come, and he wants his name again.

Doesn't understand how Victor knows it,

or how he ever thought he knew what his own name was until now.

Especially as Victor flashes his far too perfect play boy smile. His head tipped just so, his hair a softening fluff from some movement a second ago, or something errant blow of the air conditioning. The only thing missing is that perfect, well documented, wink of his. The one that makes hearts explode, and everyone weak. Dust beside the light of.

Dazzed, he only remembers those words were words he was supposed to be listening to specifically, not just the cool way Victor's tone and syllables made music out of the air and the silence, the whole of the universe defined by his mouth. There was a question and something coy and teasing at the end. About leaving him.

When he's not -- not sure anyone could. Knows how to. Victor owns the universe. It's a ball he spins on his fingers, and rolls across his shoulders, as he does to ice skating more than any lesser can even dream of in their wildest. None of this makes sense, but he's not leaving. He's not letting go.

He's struggling to remember anything. Air. Existence. Anything but those eyes. Hand reaching for the bottle in Victor's other hand, holding on but not using it, uncertain if he needs something between them, or Victor's hand free, or something to drown this sudden drowning feeling.

It coming with the low, topply, listing, impress of, "I'm not going anywhere?" He was just told not to. He just said he wouldn't. Wouldn't run away. There's no running tonight. Hadn't he said a second ago? From some reason, before this. Before it was even more impossible to consider. How could he. The whole world was in his hand. That included Yuri. Who would have dissolved, on command, if that was the next thing he whispered.

[fivetimechamp]

"No?"

He gives up the bottle willingly enough, because it gives him his other hand again, and means he can step forward, as his index finger hooks under Yuri's chin and his thumb traces his bottom lip.

Bending towards him, never minding the confused murmur of the people around them. He doesn't care about them, right now, or Chris' plans, or anything, but the look on Yuri's face in this moment: Perfect. Surprised. Eyes on his face like there's nothing else in the world to see, which Victor appreciates. Isn't that what it felt like, earlier? Just the two of them, and no one else, nothing else around? "Don't you want to come with me?"

He's never this way. Never invites anyone to come this close, or imply that they could come much, much closer. All his flirtations have always been for his audience and his fans, for the show. For the stories he tells, of love and loss and heartbreak and triumph, sorrow and joy. He's never wanted anything else but that, for himself.

He's never wanted anyone quite like this.

Eyes gone hooded and voice turned low. He's never put this effort into anyone, before. No one has ever made him wait. No one has ever said no. No one has ever made him make an effort.

He sort of enjoys it.

If he can keep Yuri's focus on him, the whole night could unfold. If –

If there wasn't the low laugh from behind him, that makes his expression turn from coy and promising to flat exasperation, because Chris, truly, has the worst timing tonight.

Or he's doing it on purpose.

Turning, with his arm sliding to around Yuri's shoulders, as his smile flips back towards cheery warmth. "Well? Did you find anything?"

[theglassheart]

Those fingers define his existence, paint his chin, his jaw into existence in a floor, smooth and cool, for barely a second, before a the pad of Victor's thumb is on his lip, and everything except that finger, and those eyes, is gone to the sudden thunder rushing in Yuri's ears, spiking in his chest.

The sudden dryness of his throat.

The sudden necessity to move into that touch.

The pressure of his lip against the finger, when his breath gets hard, heavy, fast.

As Victor asks that question and suddenly a million images explode in Yuri's brain. The offer to go somewhere, anywhere, with Victor, low and sultry. Voice gone seductive in a way that Victor only is when he's on the ice, and hasn't been in a while. Not since the most recent stories and surprises he brought them.

His whole body is fire, and--

Victor turns suddenly, making everything swing, swim, go cantering, sideways. The whole room rocking upside down, gravity entirely giving on Yuri in one hard yank, when Victor's thumb is suddenly gone, hand is no longer on him, and everything is a creshendo of ache and a matching heat. In his cheeks. In his throat. Chest. Hands. Stomach. But nothing as much as his bottom lip.

Where his tongue strayed to, rubbing at the spot on his lip, once, twice, starved and inverted and swaying, before he can even realize where or why. Anything expect that he can't swallow, can't breathe, can't think, and Chris. Chris got here at some point. Is staring down at them, all burning triumphant green eyes (even if he thinks something shifts there, shifts, or narrows, or something .... something) and that smoldering smug slide of lips echo'd in everything about how he's holding himself.

"They're bringing it now."

Yuri isn't sure words are a thing. Air, at all. What Chris is talking about at all. That anything at all anywhere is anything except that Victor just asked him whether he wanted to come away with him, those words burning in his guts, coats all of his non-existent bones, and he hadn't even gotten to answer. The only answer anything could ever go.

It was the sun asking if a plant if it wanted to learn toward it.

"You'll need more than your fancy footwork now." Chris was saying.

He was talking, but Yuri wasn't quite sure he was real, or that any word but yes burned on his lip, on his tongue, that kept. He had to stop touching. Raised the bottle and took a drink. Cold glass on his skin, liquid clinging to his lips, dribbling down his skin, from the corner of his mouth, in his wreckless haste to have something pressed on his mouth, something to stop him, something that wasn't good enough, wasn't Victor's hand, finger, mouth, an image burned on him, and having to be be wiped off with the back of his hand. "We'll see."

[fivetimechamp]

Victor's rolling his eyes, but he's more amused than anything else. Chris. Of course. Chris would be able to find salsa dancers, or vodka, or massage oil, or anything else he might want, or require, to make a point. Naturally, he could find a pole, here, in a place like this. Glancing over his shoulder, Victor can even see the men bringing it in, as guests part with curious expressions or amused ones.

"Okay." Laughed, while his free hand waves at Chris, before he lets go of Yuri to pat his old friend on the shoulder. "I look forward to seeing what you can do, Chris."

Eyes sliding back towards Yuri, who has slipped back into determination, and that, for some reason, delights him as much as anything else tonight has.

That he wants to win, too. To prove them all wrong. To remind them of why he's here to begin with. "You, too, Yuri."

Enjoying the way that name rolls off his tongue, musical and cheery, before he looks back at Chris and holds out his hand. "I'll need my phone back, Chris. Someone will have to document this face-off."

It's not like he'd miss any of it. Not now. Not when he's already looking forward to the next surprise of the night.

[theglassheart]

It's back in a second. A dizzy shiny second. Victor is back to that serene pleasantness, with his bright eyes, and charming smile. The intensity of seconds ago wiped like chalk from a slate. As Victor walks toward Chris, laying the hand that had been a Yuri seconds ago on Chris, his friend.

A hundred shots of them, doing a hundred things. Countries over. The consummate showman, leaving Yuri with his soul on fire and the only contrast the sweating glass caught up in the fingers of his hand. Feeling like he should be able to melt it, and almost instantly frustrated, confused, about whether that was all just part of the show still.

If he just fell into it like a fool.

Another game board, another place for Victor to win.
Just not on the dance floor, and that fire in him sharpens itself.

On that laughing, face, wishing them both well, happily at ease.

It washes in and out, waves that refuse to stay solid though, his feelings, thoughts, clashes between both, and the light, and the rolling floor, leaving the two men to their talk as Yuri turns to look in the direction they both had. A handful of people, not paid for this party, no, banquet, who aren't in tuxes and ties, who are quickly mounting a pole and foundation. It sticks out like an eyesore and he stares, head lolling a little, wonder just what it is he's done. Doing.

Except this is already happening. It's happening. He can't back out. Won't.

Eyes narrowing on it, and the people. That shining erected silver line.



Up and finished faster than seems possible, and he looks back toward the men at his side. He cant avoid the blindingness of Victor entering his vision, a vision all by himself, to find Chris already pushing past Victor and taking his field of vision.

Hands already pulling his shirt up, and tossing it off into a crowd, that goes crazy, while he's stretching his shoulders, grinning wolfishly, all showmanship and well founded arrogance, something that goes through Yuri's churning, molten center, strangely, with that voice all rough promise and hot readiness, wrapped in Swiss inflection, "Watch this."

Before he's shouting to the DJ to play that song.

[fivetimechamp]

He never could have imagined this night going the way it has: even with Chris, he'd expected a dull assembly full of small talk and polite smiles followed by a rowdy after-party.

In no world did he anticipate that Katsuki Yuri, of all people, would change the course of the night, and move the party from after to right now.

Katsuki Yuri, who's watching Chris through narrowed eyes, a wholly different expression than the rest of the room has as he sheds his shoes, socks, and pants, too. Making Victor laugh. What was it he was thinking, earlier? About the tendency of Chris' clothes to fall off him like they'd only been draped on, instead of buttoned and zipped and tailored to a perfect fit.

He never thought he'd enjoy himself the way he is now: Chris, being Chris. The medal, and another win, earlier. The room golden and now buzzing with energy. Surprise after surprise. The unexpected delight of Yuri standing next to him.

He's used to things going his way, but this is a pleasure of a higher caliber than he had any thought of tonight.

Hand returning, like it has a mind of its own, like he simply can't stop reaching out to touch, settling in the curve of Yuri's shoulder and neck, where his thumb lands just at the edge of that rumpled shirt collar. Already feeling familiar. Allowed.


That look on his face earlier was priceless. He'd like to see it again, but for now, he's satisfied with simply being able to do this much, as he comments, amused and fond: "Chris has never been very subtle."

[theglassheart]

There's a brush of something, so soft, but certain on his neck, and his hand goes up, even as his eyes go down. He can only see just the back part of a hand, and that dark jacket, with the tease one crisp white line of the shirt under, before he's swinging his vision to his other side. Victor. Still Victor. Perfect Victor.

That Yuri lists toward, finding the place where his other shoulder meets Victor's side, with Yuri's side, something else that stops his head. He's not entirely certain he was expecting his head to ever stop sliding through space, dizzy with the seductive and absolute captivating feeling of falling through air, and his gaze turns upward to find Victor's face again. Suddenly closer. Suddenly blinding.

A sudden smile breaking on his lips, like it was some kind of perfect joke. Landing against Victor. Finding him there again.

But there's a noise that draws his focus, his gaze, and he realizes it's cheering, even some girls who look engaged in pretending to faint in little packs, as Chris all but falls from the top, before a hand in the middle starts twisting and he spins toward the ground, but never touches, before shooting back up, twining the silver with shining skin, like a lover.

Fingers loose on the back of that hand Yuri had found, before he's shifting forward. Starting to lean forward only just after he'd stop and fallen. A hand raising to adjust glasses. . . that aren't there. That he isn't sure when he lost or where. Making his hand fall away. Somewhere. His eyes looking right and left. Before remembering he needs to be looking forward.

He's needs to be watching closely. Can't look away.
Is chasing details. Even as they blur with the dimmed lights.

Doesn't quite know when he started moving, but moves. Steps weaving, but unimportant. Needing to see everything Chris is doing. Needing heads and bodies and shoulders, these friend and even fans, out of his way. Needing to be able to see only the routine and its performer. The way his fingers curl the bar, and the way his toes point, muscles flexing and relaxing, trembling when he pauses between impressive positions.

[fivetimechamp]

He's laughing, watching Chris blows kisses to a few girls who turn such a brilliant shade of red that he expects to see steam shoot from their ears, before there's a hand covering his.

Making a small, questioning noise hiccup in his throat, as he looks down, only to see Yuri leaning into him, catching a glimpse of light reflecting off shiny, silky black hair just before there's a soft bump of contact all along his side, and Yuri's leaning against him. Side pressed to side, head caught by Victor's shoulder, leaving Victor blinking away surprise, with no very clear idea yet of if he should draw him in closer, or...

But then, that head tips back, and brown eyes are searching his face. Finding, apparently, what they were looking for, because a heartbeat later, Yuri's expression turns from blurry surprise to a smile that breaks like dawn, and transforms his whole face. Brilliant and beautiful. Heartstopping.

Stunning Victor into a frozen moment, unable to do anything but stare, eyes wide and a faint blush staining the tops of his cheeks, before there's a sensation as of his entrails being scooped from his stomach, when Yuri looks away again, apparently uncaring. Hand loosening, and focusing hard on Chris, before dropping his hand altogether and walking away.

Just walking away. A little unsteadily, but away.

Which is not a direction Victor's used to seeing. After a smile like that. After the soft press of his body all along his side.

Leaving him with another hiccup of a wordless question, standing alone and bewildered. "Huh?"

[theglassheart]

He's perfect, too.

Chris. Out there on the pole.

The way he is on the ice. A completely different kind of story, type of music, feelings. Erotic. Electric. No one here is unmoved. Even Yuri's blood is rushing, breath catching, against the music and the show. The thoughts, swimming like fish doing loops around his wrists and forearms, about whether he could even do anything like this. Near.

It's been years, and Chris' feet, arms, hands, everything is flawless. Like he's been doing this every day of his life. If pictures are to be believed it's at least a number of times a year. Stealing everyone's hearts, everyone's breath.

Loving it. Living it. Every inch of him putty and power at turns.

Everything charged. On fire.




Yuri's sure somewhere, his reaction should be something else, but his jaw sets.
He did the first and the second. He hasn't failed yet, and he isn't going to either.

[fivetimechamp]

He stares for a moment too long at Yuri's retreating back, before shaking himself, and following. Not because he has to, or because of that dance earlier, that felt like the uninhibited high of being drunk, even when he hasn't had nearly as much as Yuri –

( – and Yuri has had enough to make Victor want to shake himself, hard, about everything that seemed like, felt like – )

– because he could still decide not to, could join the other skaters in their groups around the dance floor and take part in their amusement and photos. He's no helpless sheep, and it's clear Yuri's attention is focused elsewhere, now.




But he still goes. Some inner curiosity driving him to see what will happen next. Maybe the same instinct that had his hand finding Yuri's back or shoulder or cheek again and again, like he'd lost all control over it.

(He has always hated losing control.)

And, to watch Chris, too: his mood brightening when Chris swings out, legs spread-eagled, and casts a sultry look back at the audience, making Victor laugh and applaud. "Sexy, Chris!"

And, well. His earlier madness aside, this is still the best time he's had at the GPF banquet in as long as he's been coming to them.

[theglassheart]

There are dozens of voices. Even if the dance floor has thinned and there are people at the far walls of the room now, there are still a good number of them here, and a good number who seem to have ventured even closer for this. A display that usually only gets seen in the smallest of social media shots. Suddenly, right here, in front of them. A good number of people. A good number of voices.

It shouldn't be that easy to hear just one.


But Yuri does.



Looking over his shoulder to find Victor, smiling, laughing, clapping, and cheering (and when did Victor get that far away?). Calling out Chris' name. Calling him sexy. And all of the sudden, it doesn't matter if it's true (and it's so true), if Yuri was thinking every same thought seconds ago (and he was, he had been, it's undeniable, Chris is sexy, sex personified), he doesn't want Chris' name in Victor's mouth.

He leaned down, going at his shoes, as the music was ending and the crowd was just losing it entirely. Victor's easy, excited, pleased laughter and voice in his ears. Present or repeating, it didn't matter. When Yuri was sliding his shoes off and pulling his nice dress socks next, leaving them there on the floor, as he was stepping out in bare feet to Chris' semi-blurred face.

Lit up as if made of gold, resplendent on the shade of his skin. Eyes of emeralds and chest muscles shining on deep breaths.

Yuri isn't sure what he said, even though it was something. It was something. Nice, maybe. Or something like it. While he was still only halfway there, hands on his pants, and for a second distracted because he thought he heard his name. He thought he heard Celestino saying his name. Shouting it? But in the blur of the crowd, he couldn't really tell, and nothing was going to stop him. Nothing. He could find him after. Whatever it was could wait.

There's a cheer starting, but he doesn't care about that either. Even when it's gathering at the nape of his neck, where his shirt brushes his skin. (Where a hand had.) His pants are in his hands, and the music hasn't started yet, building the crowds noise, and he thinks that's Chris, too, and he knows he doesn't have the same look or demeanor, or even underwear, as Chris. But he doesn't care. Those are all details. He remembers what Minako said, all those years ago.

When he was appalled and scarlet teenage embarrassment,


It's all still telling a story.

If your body can tell the story, where doesn't matter.


The music finally does start, and Yuri settled into his soles, eyes closing for a second, catching the beat driving beneath it, under it, in him. Hands, and then arms by extension, coming into his chest, and the fluid upward. Around his chest and up over his head, before a hand ever reaches toward the bar, and even then not touching at first. It skims gracefully up, and down, bare centimeters from connecting with the metal, like a caress (it's your partner, your lover), through the air from the highest point he can reach and descending back down.

Fingers curling the solid metal, finally, only when it's at perfect even from his shoulder, but at the same time his other hand had popped out from his chest the opposite direction. The same directions as his head popped suddenly, eyes flashing open, to look, right down the line of his arm, over the flat of his hand, exactly where Victor was in the crowd. Definitive. Demanding.

Before his far arm came across his body in an arc, to meet his other arm,

Second-hand curling right above the first, and he turned fast with it,
into the center and a spin around it, weight on his extended arms.

[fivetimechamp]

It isn't until he's clapping for Chris' final spin and pose, and looks over to comment on it to Yuri, that he notices he's alone, but it doesn't take long to find what he's looking for in the crowd: Yuri's already making his way towards the pole, face set, barefoot, hands working at the button and fly of his pants.

It feels like swallowing a lump of coal, only to have it light itself once deep in his gut. Eyes widening, and throat gone strangely dry and painful.

There's a derisive noise next to him, and he looks over, and down, to see Yuri Plisetsky glaring at the dance floor, face gone red, arms crossed, shoulders set in a terrible imitation of indifference. "This is so gross."

Making Victor smile, as he looks back up, his own arms crossing, weight shifting. "It's probably inappropriate for the junior skaters."

Just a little dig. He does enjoy getting under Yuri's skin, prodding him until he gets a reaction, and this time is no different: out of the corner of his eye, he can see Yuri's face getting redder. It looks like he's getting ready to kick him in the shin, and Victor opens his mouth to egg him on a little further, when a shiver at the back of his neck notifies him to a shift in the mood around him.

Looking up, and around, to see people looking his way, faces gone shocked or suspicious, and he doesn't underst–

Until he looks past them, and sees it. Katsuki Yuri, staring him down, over a shoulder, over the length of one long and graceful arm.

Huh?

Surprise followed by a rush of adrenaline that hits like a freight train, coursing electric through his entire system, rinsing cold and then hot, at the look in those eyes. The poise, even with his rumpled shirt, and only his shorts beneath.

Until his hands move, and his arms follow, and Victor's eyes, do, too, because Yuri is coiling around that pole, and there's something wrong with his chest, because it feels too tight to breathe.

Still stuck on a stare. An issued challenge. An...invitation?

So maybe he wasn't wrong?

Maybe he was right? After all?

[theglassheart]

It's a liquid blur, but it glides through his muscles.

Aching as much against prior exertion, as though with longing to just be back in it.

A reprieve from the prison of standing still. So much standing still, watching the deck turn sideways. A clarity that comes only with the music being absorbed into his movements, or maybe it's his movements absorbing it, and the noise of the people around the floor, that comes and goes in waves.

His focus demanded elsewhere. The tension in his grip. The stretch of muscles in his upper arm. His thighs straining to remember what flows into what, how. Where his hands need to move. What the rest of his body needs to do while secured by what point. Gravity and foundation no longer required on his feet, where it is every other hour of the day. No, sliding silver blades, only a few millimeters thick, beneath the center of his feet.

It anchors to a single slender line of silver.

About the width of a small wrist. Can be used by a number of parts of him.

That concerns him less than the faint reminder here, and there, shifting, that his shirt is not helping his movements.

It's not perfect. Not flawless, but it feels good to just let go, to not care if is or isn't. To ride the music, the crowd, the warning burn in his muscles, that is left just as far behind as everything else. A high, sloshing and washing, through him when he catches the surprised and amazed, even enrapt, faces of those people closest to him, when he pauses to hold, barely breathing, already thinking to the next movement.

Always distracted, each time, when he's facing that way, taking the seconds he never could when skating, when it's all about that moment. Wanting to know. Needing to know. If Victor is still there. Still watching him. Still stock still the way he'd stopped suddenly at the beginning. Wants those eyes on him. Wants him to know there is nothing else in the room worth looking at. Worth his time. His attention.

But never long enough. It's only long enough for another round of applause, like ballet dancers, like opera singers, but not like competitive skating (where there are no stops, no breakings, no other faces, only beginnings and endings and everything riding through them, heaven and hell at once, in-between those) and then it's onward, again. Racing the music, racing his heart, for the next turnout among blurry memories most of a decade old, but not forgotten it seems, either.

[fivetimechamp]

Whatever he expected, it wasn't this.

A different person than the one doing flips and handstands on the dance floor, annoying Yuri, flush-faced and energetic. A different person than the one he'd mirrored, than the one who laughed and pretended to be a bull chasing Victor down. A different person than the one who gripped his leg, and wrapped an arm around his middle, and laughed as they spun into a pas de deux that Victor's not sure he's recovered from, even now.

It's a totally different kind of movement, and a slowly building intensity, and – he can't shake the feeling, every time it happens, every time there's a carefully controlled pose, weight balanced against the pole and a hand or ankle or thigh – that it's for him.

Because Yuri keeps meeting his gaze. Or, no. Catching it. Demanding it? Something almost angry in his focus, grim determination, brown eyes finding his from beneath brows lowered in concentration or effort or both.

As if he could look away. As if there's a part of him that isn't watching those fingers wrap around the slim silver pole, and not imagining them around his wrist instead.

As if watching thigh and calf muscles go taut under skin as doesn't send sudden boiling images of just how solidly they can grip, leave him wondering how they'd feel around his hips, or waist.

As if skaters aren't flexible enough, already, but it's rarely used like this: their spins and poses meant for beauty, not sensuality, but here, in a different context, all he can think of is being tied up in knots, legs and fingers and arms twining and refusing to let go.

Around him, people clap and cheer and wolf-whistle, but he's too busy watching, too busy meeting those eyes, accepting it. Whatever's being offered. Everything. All of it.

He wants it all.

[theglassheart]

He's there. In the crowd. Not focused. But Yuri can feel it. Somehow. Knows it.
He's there. Victor. Victor, the victor. In every cell of his skin. Wanting it. Feeling it.

At the edge, where Yuri left him. Last saw him. He doesn't know where Chris has gone. Doesn't know if it was Celestino who called his name. Can't define who all is beside Victor. But it doesn't seem like it's a lot of people. The crowd is shoulder to shoulder everywhere, but even from this distance, even through the haze of his unhelpful, unfocused vision it's like there's a hallow around him.

Like everyone around him had left some space. Made space. Moved some.

But Yuri can't tell. Doesn't want to. Doesn't care about the rest of them. Anything but that brilliant shock of silver-grey, a corona of flaring light that sets him entirely apart, above. Brighter than the fixture far too close to Yuri's head to be missed, or ignored even. Something not to hit, but also, something caught up in his eyes, dotting his vision and making him focus even more. His hands. His back curling, falling back, held only by this thighs, hanging.

The dazed colors nothing like the spot of Victor in his vision. Blinding brilliance. He swears he can see his eyes.
Swears with every breath he refuses to even consider taking, that he won't let go. Of those eyes. Of that attention.
He'll hold it and keep it and make it so Victor wants nothing else in the world, this dance floor, Yuri in the middle of it.

The demand on himself to be better. The best. Mind filling with the fingers under his chin. The thumb on his lips. The low whisper against his lips. The laughter from only minutes earlier. The way his hands had been curved on the man's body. Music that wasn't so much music as thunder in his veins. Demand. Denial. Scalded to the core of his bones by a fire that was all his body had become. (Don't you want to come with me?)

Tendrils and gouts of fire licking at the silver post, exploding, expanding, all the way to his fingertips, all the way to his toes.

He might not be able to match Chris' prowess, his practice, but Yuri is known for his steps and Yuri's known for his spins, for his unexpected stamina, that no one in his earlier brackets were expected to have, and he takes what he knows and pushes it in there everywhere. Every moment his feet touch the ground, hands using the pole as though someone else is there, under it, in it with them, with him, before his feet find the pole again and the spins are back in the air.

Until he stops, with the music, hand clenched, arm tight and long, pain somewhere, but further away than even his feet most days, everything shaking with the weight of his breath. Everything stopping exactly where it started. One hand out, one focus point. Victor, and the only answer he could ever have. (Yes, and yes, and yes.) It's the only thing in his eyes, in his head, with every breath his lungs demand from him suddenly.




Right before Chris steps into the space between them.

[fivetimechamp]

No one else exists.

No one important, anyway: the crowd around him is just a moving, blurred mass of color and sound, but nothing sticks out, except for the boy on the pole. And he: he is in hyper-saturated Technicolor, every line crisp and clean. Slick skin, rumpled shirt, that tie hanging loose around his neck. Hair gone every which way, and Victor can't believe he was so stupid as to use the word debauched, before, because before was nothing at all like this.

Katsuki Yuri, looping himself up and around the pole, muscles in forearms and legs standing out under the ballroom lights. Cheeks flushed, eyes brilliant, while his body writes new music.

Maybe not as precise as Chris' performance, but all the more appealing for it: even with the heavy thud of bass, even with his tie gone loose and tempting, even with the promise in his eyes and the intention in every grip and loop of the pole, there's something still naive and raw about it, that's nothing like Chris' experience, his assurance.

A little rough-edged, a little too desperate. Creating music, writing a story: of someone who perhaps isn't well-versed in love or passion, but knows it, is experiencing it. Wants it, maybe without knowing what it is.

And who has picked the perfect victim to start with.




Of course. (His heart is pounding.) There's no way it isn't, is there? No way it couldn't be meant for him, written to him. Like a love letter scrawled across the pure ice of a rink, or the polished wood of a dance floor, or along the slim, gleaming line of a pole. It started with him: dedicated to him by the line of an arm and a pinning glance, and then offered over and over again throughout, and now...

Now, Yuri is suspended on the pole in a graceful line, and he's there, again. That hand. That arm. Those eyes. All aligned toward him, and it's hard to breathe. Or maybe he's stopped breathing. Or maybe the world has.

Thinking, in an insane laugh, again, that this is not how he thought the evening would go. Wondering where it's coming from. Why Yuri chose him.

He's used to being wanted. He's even used to attempts at seduction, that have never worked because he has only ever wanted that passion for her performance, and it seemed cheap to throw it away on something as flawed and fickle as a person.

But – now ...

It's the first time someone has been able to meet him there. To push it further, and faster. Putting on a show. Creating a fairytale.

He isn't used to wanting anything other than the next gold medal, and the surprise of his audience. He's not sure he knows what to do with wanting Katsuki Yuri.

All he knows is that there's the force of a magnet, or gravity, or the momentum of a spin working its will on him, and there's nothing he can do but step forward, towards that outreaching arm, toward those eyes that pin him, toward that invitation. All he can do is be seduced.


...Until the line of sight between them is suddenly cut, by a gleaming, naked back, and a familiar crown of golden hair, and it feels like being cut from a jump harness, and suddenly plummeting to the ice.

Blinking at Chris's back and shoulders, too startled to be annoyed, like someone had just dumped a bucket of ice water on his head. "Hey..."

Hand lifting, as he steps forward, but Chris is already moving, back towards the pole, and Yuri, and that's not right, that invite wasn't for him.

Victor's sure of it.

[theglassheart]

He isn't expecting it. Or maybe he is. But, it wasn't where he'd finished, where he'd left off. Chris's face suddenly before him. Smile something warm and confusing, because Yuri's sure there's something there. Something he can't quite identify in it, and he can't quite make himself stay there. When his eyes are trying to go back where they had been. But Chris is. Right there. Right in front of him. (Right in front of Victor.)

And the hold of his arm is trembling slightly the longer he supports more than half of his weight on the triangle of it, between his hand and his thighs. Which is barely a though, and, apparently, not one of Chris's, when he's grinning, broadly. "Not bad. Not bad at all. Not perfect, of course, but--" A champagne bottle is actually pushed from one of Chris's hands into the only hand Yuri has left, and it's calculation of immediate confusion, making him feel the anchor point in the one hand even more, while Chris doesn't seem to care nor pauses. "Better than I was expecting. But, are you ready for round two?"

Round . . . t w o?

It's all but written on Yuri's face for a blink in spaced black lines.

Like he hasn't even collected his brain enough from the first, and the only place he'd planned to go from there is suddenly not there at all. The brilliant silver-grey splash of light absolved in golden and green. Not right, but demanding his attention and his focus, torn between his own body and Chris's face.

Except the idea of surrender and excuse is met with something too sharp and broke ice, glass jagged, in his gut, where the whine of churning, burning, heat is bleeding into anything else it can. Firing behind this new hiss of a woken feeling. That isn't new at all. He's surrendered too much today. His mind and mouth have been full of excuses. Voices, and replays, and -- he hasn't lost anything, anywhere in this room tonight, and he's not starting now either.

"Let's go, then." Not that he has the faintest clue how to juggle having one hand suddenly, and the other is getting slick on wet beading, and this shirt has to go. All of it. Now. There's a laugh beneath him, as he does the only thing he can think of. Needs for a second. Curling back into bar, to use his shoulder, chest, knees, to shift where balance and hold is, pulling at buttons around glass, while the bar suddenly shivers and shakes beneath him, making him look down, briefly, as suddenly there is another body attaching itself to the pole. Chris, showing off, suddenly a fluid current of dark skinned movement beneath him, mezmerizing in the sheer level of unexpectedness, while he looks almost, what?, treed here.

And then he's almost upside down. And then he is. Chris. Not him. And it's. This is not a view of Christophe Giacometti he thought he would ever need, or happen to end up seeing, and definitely not this close. His face is getting hotter. His ears, even. There's a movement of Chris's head, and that thing Yuri still can't place a finger on. But it's circling his collar, toying with the hair sticking the backs of ears and the sides of his cheeks.

It's ginger when he uncurls, that shirt still only half unbuttoned, to place one of his feet and then the other on the undersides of Chris's upside down spread eagle. Solid, quivering muscle and he thinks, oddly enough, as he's daring to take his one hand off, fast at his buttons, and yanking it off around the bottle, that he gets it. Suddenly. Like one of the popping bubbles of the champagne. He gets it.

This strange and wild expression looking up at him, straining muscles but startlingly green eyes. It's not the same as earlier. It's not ... not like finding a partner in the oddest spot. It's not like finding himself reflected in every ounce of grace, able to be lead and take the lead, each seamlessly blurring into and out of and blending into one. That isn't how he's being looked at, when his shirt goes one direction and his hand goes back to the bar. It's like - like - a kids' unfettered smile, even under all that fire-bitten smoldering warmth.

Like through it, there's the smile of someone who's found not a partner, but a playmate?

Like it's a game, this is a game, has always been a game, just a game, after all, and not a competition at all?

And Yuri finds himself giving the oddest sudden laugh. The sounded shivering through his whole body, melting any ice that had suddenly built between his muscles. As a leg lifts, and he spins half the circle bar, only balancing on one leg, and leaving one in the air, on hand on the bar, the toes still down dragging the line of the one thigh beneath him, while the champagne goes flying around him, dappling down on both of them.