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When Victor is ten, he’s sent to Saint Petersburg to live with Yakov.
By eight, he’d surpassed students twice his age in his intermediate skating class at the local rink—and then he’d surpassed the instructors.
“I’ve taught you all I can—“
“He needs somewhere where he has room to grow—“
“This boy is going to go far—“
They had decided his future for him before he even knew what he wanted.
“But mama—“
“Hush, Vitya, this will be good for you. For us.” Victor’s mother said, a stern but faraway look in her eyes, like she was trying to convince herself of her words.
Home for Victor is syrniki on Sundays, braiding his mama’s long silver hair, and skating on the familiar ice. Home for Victor is in Moscow. But if his mother wants him to go, he’ll go.
And so Victor went, because maybe if he went, his mama wouldn’t look so sad all the time, maybe if he went, he could make his father proud and he’d come back to them—to him. Maybe if he went, he could fix his family. And so he went.
Yakov welcomes him with a rough clap to the back and shows him his room.
He eats dinner with Yakov and his wife Lilia, who will become his ballet instructor, even though he’s never been good at ballet, but training under the prima will help him on the ice. He picks at his peas and borscht until Lilia orders him to sit up straight and stop playing with his food. He feels tense and uncomfortable and out of place in Yakov and Lilia’s house, but he can’t say anything about it, because what can be done anyway? He’s here now, and he’s here to stay.
That night, Victor sits on his twin bed in Yakov’s house and thinks, I miss home.
“ Prodigy.” “Genius.” “Brilliant.”
Lonely.
//
When Katsuki Yuuri is ten, he watches Victor Nikiforov take gold in the Junior Grand Prix Finals for the first time and decides that he’s going to skate on the same ice with him one day.
So he skates and he skates until his feet blister and bruise and he’s exhausted by the time he rolls into bed.
The other kids at school make fun of him, but that’s okay because he’s got Yuuko, and Takeshi, though Takeshi shoves him around—until he sees some bullies take Yuuri’s lunch money (the bullies learn to never mess with Yuuri again)—that’s when he knows Takeshi cares about him. But most of all, he’s got Vicchan, his best friend and confidant and who’s there for him after every grueling skating practice, reminding him why he loves skating.
He has his family—otou-san, okaa-san, and Mari-neesan, who all support him, though they don’t quite understand if it’s all worth it. But it’s okay, because he’ll prove it to them—he’ll prove himself, because he has to . Has to make them proud, make sure the five am before-school practices, the countless hours in Minako-sensei’s studio, the dieting—make sure it’s not all for nothing.
When he comes home, it’s to okaa-san’s warm food and a soak in the onsen . To Yuuri, that’s home.
//
Victor is fourteen and he’s won his first gold at the Junior Grand Prix Finals. He should be ecstatic—he is ecstatic. He sits next to Yakov in the kiss and cry and clutches the Makka plush and smiles and waves when they receive the final scores and tries desperately (in vain) not to think about the empty spot in the stands.
“Hi, mama. I just wanted to ask if you’d gotten the tickets I sent. The finals are in Moscow this year, I was thinking—I mean, maybe, if—if you’d like to come? Yakov says he thinks I have a pretty big chance this year—well, not in those exact words, he’s Yakov—but I know what he meant. Anyway, call me back maybe? When you get the chance. Bye.”
His mother doesn’t call him back. And she doesn’t show up. So he’s won his first gold at an international competition, so he’s the winner, it’s even in his name, but he doesn’t quite feel like he’s won anything now.
He’s quite on the short flight back home—or Yakov’s house, he should say. It doesn’t quite feel like home yet, but neither does his mother’s house in Moscow anymore.
//
Yuuri is eighteen and completely, utterly alone in a new city. He’s surrounded by unfamiliar people, speaking an unfamiliar language, and skating in an unfamiliar rink. Frankly, he’s terrified.
He takes refuge in indulging in greasy snacks from the convenience store down the street from his dorm—it’s no conbini , but it’ll do. The snacks are briefly comforting until he thinks of all the calories in the bag of Doritos he’s gorging on; never mind the season hasn’t officially started, he doesn’t need to put on any extra weight, doesn’t need another reason to not belong here, doesn’t need the American skaters to wonder what a dime-a-dozen Japanese skater is doing here in their rink. So he stashes the junk food and he’s alone again with no food to distract him—just his thoughts.
So he does the only thing he can do, the only thing that calms the anxiety buzzing under his skin during times like these—skate.
He doesn’t go to the official rink where he’ll start pre-season training under Celestino on Monday, but to the closest local rink he finds on his phone. It doesn’t matter that the rink is too crowded for any spins, much less a jump, too full of waddling toddlers and lovesick couples. He can just skate without being recognized or criticized, and he does figures around the perimeter of the rink and feels the buzzing calm to a low hum—always there, but subtle enough now that he can ignore it.
He doesn’t want to go back to his depressing dorm room where he’s left alone with the untethered thoughts left flying loose in his brain and the stash of junk food under his twin bed. He wants to stay on the rink forever because the ice is the closest thing he has to a home right now, but the rink closes at eleven. But that’s okay, he’ll be okay, Yuuri tells himself over and over in his head, like a mantra. This is okay. This can be home.
//
Phichit arrives on one of the hottest, sunniest days in Detroit, which is appropriate, Yuuri thinks.
Because Phichit Chulanont is the living definition of a ray of sunshine and he introduces himself with the air of pure, unfettered happiness that Yuuri hasn’t felt in a long time.
“Ohmygod, Katsuki Yuuri is going to be my roommate?” Phichit whirls around to Celestino with almost an accusing tone. “How could you not tell me this?!”
Yuuri feels vaguely uncomfortable and takes Phichit’s bags to the room where he’ll be staying. When he reemerges, Phichit gushes, “I’ve watched your 2008 Lohengrin routine dozens of times! I learned how to do the triple flip watching that routine!”
Yuuri instantly reels because shit, that routine is from my dark past! “Um, you don’t have to pretend I’m that great of a skater, I mean, cause I’m not, really—I didn’t even qualify for the finals this year…”
And Phichit’s expression completely drops as Celestino sighs behind him, forlorn and also completely used to Yuuri’s shit by now.
“How could you say that? Tons of skaters look up to you! (Somewhere in Japan, Kenjirou Minami perks up in the middle of taping his seventeenth Katsuki Yuuri poster, without knowing why.) Phichit accuses.
“Ah—“ Yuuri flushes red and backtracks, fleeing to his room and accidentally slamming the door.
Despite their first meeting, Yuuri and Phichit get on amazingly. Yuuri’s never been a big brother or been able to connect with other people his age, but he feels a surge of protectiveness over Phichit, who’s sixteen, younger than he was when he arrived here, without anybody by his side and so different from everybody else, and he’s going to make sure that Phichit never feels alone, the way he did here—in this city that is too loud and too cold and will eat you alive if you let it.
So Yuuri helps him with his high school homework and indulges in Phichit’s many Instagram selfies, despite not using much social media himself. They help each other on the ice as well; Yuuri helps Phichit with his step sequences and Phichit helps Yuuri with his confidence, which flickers like a weak candle, but lately has been stronger and stronger.
“Yuuri! That was amazing! Holy crap!”
Yuuri skates over the board where Phichit is, “Ah, thanks, Phichit-kun, but I touched down on the triple lutz and the spins could have been tighter—”
Phichit rolls his eyes. “I know you’re your own worst critic, but forget about the technicalities for a minute and just be proud of yourself! That was an incredible run through!”
Yuuri frowns, “I should really do it again though, there are so many improvements I need to make—”
“Ugh, you and your amazing stamina,” Phichit rolls his eyes good-naturedly. “Fine, run through it again.”
Later, over their dinner, (kale and unseasoned fish fillets. Yuuri mourns the days of fried food.) Phichit shoves his phone in Yuuri’s face over the table. “Look! If you won’t believe me, then believe my 1.3 million instagram followers!” He exclaims with an entirely too self-satisfied look on his face that Yuuri’s learned to fear..
Squinting, Yuuri takes the phone and takes a closer look and—“ You filmed me??! Phichit, that routine wasn’t nearly competition ready, what the hell — ” He notes with horror that the video of him skating his unpolished short program (that shows him completely wiping out on his triple axel) has more than 200,000 views and 15,000 comments within the first five hours.
“Okay, whatever, but look at the comments,” Phichit dismisses Yuuri’s concerns with a wave of his hand, taking his phone back and tapping on the comments, giving it back to Yuuri.
@moshimoshimelissa
Holy shit, crush me with those thighs pls
@katsudamnyuuri
がんばろう Katsuki-San!!!
@gays_on_ice
Oh my god I live for Katsuki sightings on Phichit’s instagram
@nikinikinikiforov
We’ll all be rooting for you at the 4CC Yuuri!!
@alexwashere._.
Damn, if he skates like that at every competition, Nikiforov’s gotta watch out
Yuuri slams the phone down, ignoring Phichit’s indignant “hey!” , face flaming at the prospect that he could actually be considered competition to Victor— such a far fetched idea and so what exactly he wants that he refuses to dwell on it, except in his most indulgent fantasies late at night, in which maybe he and Victor meet on the podium and Victor turns with that crowd-winning smile and says, “Hey, Katsuki, right? I liked your routine”—
Phichit’s watching him, face smug and expectant. “See? Everyone else thinks you’re great too, Yuuri,” his smile softening and his voice gentle. And Yuuri is so touched that Phichit would do this for him, just to show him—
And oh shit, Yuuri is not going to cry, he’s not going to cry— and he’s crying. Phichit looks momentarily alarmed, but it’s hardly the first time Yuuri’s cried in front of him before, and he recovers quickly and just gives a kind smile and reaches out to hold Yuuri’s hand across the table. And Yuuri almost breaks, right there, and almost spills all his deepest fears and insecurities, that he’s afraid that he still doesn’t belong and maybe he never will, that his parents wasted so much time and money on him only to not even turn out to be such a successful skater, and that’s why he pushes himself so hard, because there’s always something to improve, to refine, maybe jump higher and maybe make his spins tighter, because he has to prove to himself—and to the world, if he’s honest—that it was all worth it, that he deserves to be with the other top skaters of the world, that he’s not a fraud.
Because Yuuri has never been particularly talented, never been a prodigy—he’s not like Victor Nikiforov, a genius from the start, or like JJ Leroy, only fifteen but already making waves in the figure skating community with his technical prowess. No, Yuuri got to where he is with hard work. Sure, he was a little above average on the rink when he first started off, but he still had to work harder than others, had to put countless hours in the rink, in the ballet studio, running laps around Hasetsu—to get here.
He almost tells Phichit, almost opens up the open wounds of his insecurities and pours out his guts, the worst parts of himself. But instead, he wipes away his tears and squeezes Phichit’s hands.
“I still can’t believe you filmed me without knowing—is that why you let me run through it again??” He manages a watery smile.
Relieved, Phichit shrugs his shoulders. “What can I say? You wouldn’t take my word for it,” He laughs.
And here, with Phichit and his unrelenting happiness and support, in a city that’s not quite so unfamiliar anymore, Yuuri thinks, this could be home.
//
Victor is twenty-two and he’s won the Russian Nationals, European Championships, World Championships, and the Grand Prix Finals this year.
He decides that it’s high time he moved out of Yakov’s house. To be honest, the move has been long overdue—he could have moved out years ago, was planning to when he was seventeen—but then the divorce happened, and he couldn’t leave the man who’s the closest thing he has to a father figure, despite all of Yakov’s prickly insistence that he’s fine. And then he stayed for five more years even though he’s a full grown adult and could easily take care of himself—has basically been taking care of himself, Yakov’s certainly never babied him, even when he was barely a preteen, though staying here that long makes him feel like a bit of a baby.
And so Victor buys an apartment in the more luxurious parts of Saint Petersburg—between the combined first-place winnings of the past few seasons and the various sponsorships, he can more than afford it.
When he’s all packed up and ready to go, he stands outside and takes a good look at Yakov’s house, where he’s lived for the last twelve years. Looks at the scraggly rose bushes that have long since stopped sprouting every spring after Lilia left, the crooked window shutters, the cracking paint—looks at his home, or what was his home. A lot has happened in this house. Yakov was there when he was fourteen and hadn’t seen his mother in two years, hadn’t had as much as a happy birthday phone call, or any contact really, Yakov was there telling him “not to waste his tears on someone who doesn’t deserve them.” And Yakov was there when Victor was sixteen and his first boyfriend had cheated on him, with the same piece of sage advice he’d given him two years ago. And it was Yakov, so there were no hugging or heartfelt conversations, but there was a glass of water and Advil waiting by his bed when he woke up after a night of drinking himself silly after that breakup, and there were heavy claps on the back and awkward gruff words of advice, and it was enough. Likewise, Victor was there to pick Yakov up at the bar the night after Lilia packed up all her stuff and he was there the next day, distracting him with far fetched ideas about his new routine—anything to take his mind off the divorce.
And he feels silly about the prickling feeling behind his eyes because he’ll still see Yakov every day at the rink, and this isn’t going to be the last time he comes to this house either—but he looks over at Yakov’s stone face that is almost imperceptibly somber as well (which is Yakov’s equivalent to sobbing uncontrollably, basically) and feels placated.
So he bites back the unshed tears and hugs Yakov and gets an awkward pat on the back in return, which is okay, because that’s what Yakov knows, and then he’s off.
Victor’s new apartment is sleek, modern, and industrial. It’s also completely empty, save for one mattress. His stuff is still with the moving company, and the apartment feels cold even though he turned the heater on, but that’s okay, because Makka is here with him, and that’s how he falls asleep that day: sleeping on the bare mattress, holding Makka, and thinking this is home now.
//
Yuuri is twenty-three and it is the worst day of his life. Vicchan is dead and he wasn’t even there for him, and he can’t stop thinking about how scared his beloved dog must have been in his final moments, and even though he had the rest of the Katsukis, Yuuri should have been there . On top of that, he just spectacularly self-destructed on the ice in the Grand Prix Finals on international television, and fucking Victor Nikiforov didn’t even recognize as a fellow skater—why would he, after all? After the way he skated tonight, Yuuri wouldn’t recognize himself as a competitive figure skater either.
It could have been any of these three things, or a combination of all of them that compels Yuuri to drink sixteen glasses of champagne that night. At first, he’s too ashamed and too awkward to talk to any of the other skaters—he doesn’t have many friends in the competitive circuit besides Phichit after all, and he’s not here. And he’s definitely not going to talk to any sponsors today, considering the way his performance went, he doubts any of them would be interested in speaking to him. So he tries not to sulk in the corner too much and downs glass after glass until his mind goes static, bitterly regretting his insistence that he come to the banquet, even though Celestino said he didn’t have to— “Everyone would understand Yuuri, I know you’re going through a hard time right now”— because somehow not showing up would be even worse. He may be a loser, but he’s not going to be a sore loser.
He wakes up the next morning and rushes to the bathroom, heaving up the contents of his stomach. Then he checks the time on his phone— fuck —and shoves everything in his luggage because he’s late for his flight. He completely misses the slip of paper that he knocks to the ground when he grabbed his glasses, and the scrap with the +7 Russian area code is lost underneath the hotel bed.
Then he self-immolates at the Japanese Nationals he’s been winning since he was a teenager and feels something inside him snap.
He can’t go back to Detroit now. Of course, he has to go back for his things and to say bye to Phichit and end things with Celestino, but it’s time to leave the place that he’s called home for so long without really meaning it. Because it isn’t, isn’t really. Phichit makes it better, but for Yuuri, the frigid winters and push-and-shove city slicker attitudes of the locals and the way the streets are never empty even at 4am fuck— have never been home for him.
He doesn’t know how to explain it, exactly, only that it feels like something’s missing inside him, like Vicchan died and took a part of Yuuri with him, that deep down, he’s not quite right and he doesn’t know what it is, only knows that he has to try and find the missing piece. So he goes home hoping he’ll maybe find it there.
Home for Yuuri is in Hasetsu and always will be, he thinks. The tiny seaside town moves slow enough for him to think clearly and the ever-present headache of his anxiety can be calmed down enough so that he can live without his palms constantly sweating or always stuttering over his words.
Except...not quite. When he lands in Hasetsu Minako-sensei is there to greet him and he’s horrified but a bit touched but still mostly horrified when he sees posters of himself running through Sakura petals plastered over the train station that he definitely does not remember posing for.
Hasetsu has changed in the five years Yuuri was gone (Really, since when does Hasetsu have elevated railways?) and in other ways, is completely the same.
Yuuri locks himself in his room for days and allows himself to indulge in the familiar Japanese snacks he’s been deprived of during his years in the states—and then feels sick to his stomach. As Minako-sensei had so helpfully pointed out, he’s not really in top form right now. He needs to work the calories off now or he’s going to go crazy, and besides, it’s getting too cramped in his room and he’s tired of sitting around so he goes for a run. That’s it, really just a run...and he ends up in front of ice castle.
He may have thought he was home, but really, he always spent more time at ice castle than the onsen in his childhood anyway. And it hurts, a little bit, but in a good way, to be back on the ice after such a spectacular failure, to be reminded of what he lost. But really, it just feels good, to be back where he belongs, to be home.
//
Victor Nikiforov. At twenty-seven, the most decorated men’s single skater in history. He should be on top of the world—and he is. But here’s the thing, when you’re on top of the world, there’s no one else beside you.
He doesn’t dare voice these thoughts—not to Yakov, definitely not to the media. They’d tear him apart, call him an ingrate, big-headed, arrogant. And maybe they’d be right, but you’re allowed to be arrogant if you are the best. So he is the best, but the gold medal feels like a noose when they place it over his neck and he swears it’s harder to breathe—but wait, he’s on the podium. Smile and wave. Smile and wave. See, the thing they don’t tell you about being on the top of the world, is that there’s nowhere to go but down.
At twenty-seven, Victor is as good as dead. (Shh, don’t let anybody else know.) Physically, he is in top form, despite being the oldest one there, he is still dominating the competition and could probably go for a couple more seasons. But skaters are done when they lose their inspiration, and Victor’s been surprising the audience since he was fifteen and skated in an androgynous bondage-inspired costume, and he doesn’t know what to do next—at this point, the only way to surprise anybody would be to fall from a high, high point, down to the very bottom.
He dreads going back home—or, it’s not really home is it— it’s just a place he sleeps. His real home is on the ice but even the ice has been feeling claustrophobic for years, like the walls are closing in on him and crushing him into a mold of what other people expect him to be. Living Legend , they call him. The Hero of Russia. He doesn’t want to be a hero, he can’t even save himself.
So Victor Nikiforov is alone. With no home, no family, and no inspiration.
Then Katsuki Yuuri crashes into his life, drunk on sixteen glasses of champagne and pole dancing, stealing his whole heart while grinding on him and demanding “Be my coach, Victooorrrr!”
And Victor feels like maybe, maybe, he’s found his inspiration.
//
Victor is twenty-seven and Katsuki Yuuri hasn’t contacted him, and it’s been a week. He’s fucking devastated. He doesn’t want to say it was love at first sight because he’s not a fool, but he could see himself loving Yuuri so easily but Yuuri hasn’t called him and he doesn’t know if he ever will. But maybe he’s just been busy? He’s preparing for the Japanese Nationals after all, and it’s only been a week. Or maybe he lost his phone? Or maybe, maybe maybe—
Victor needs to stop kidding himself. He doesn’t know what he was expecting—that Yuuri would call him, and they’d fall in love? That Katsuki Yuuri could fill all the empty parts of his life, glue all the broken parts of him together? He’s old enough by now to stop falling for silly fantasies of a pretty boy coming into his life and fixing him—because maybe at this point he’s too broken and missing a few too many parts for anyone to fix.
But still, he’d really thought—maybe, Yuuri was different? He knows that Yuuri is a fan, could see it in his skating even before he drunkenly announced that he had twenty two posters of Victor in his bedroom. (Victor won’t admit how much that made him grin—he won’t.) But maybe that’s all he is to Yuuri—an idol, a prize at the top to admire, not a real person to love. It’s just—the way they’d danced and talked (And the way that Victor can’t stop thinking about his eyes or his hair or the way that he danced on that pole—wait, stop)—Victor is loathe to be a cliché, but he swears he felt a spark.
He sighs, and starts choreographing a new routine.
//
Victor is twenty-seven and bored out of his mind skating the same routines over and over again and just winning and winning (and he’s aware that he sounds like an asshole but he really doesn’t care). And then he sees the boy who swept him off his feet (literally) at the banquet and who never called him again, he sees the skater who wiped out during the final and his own nationals (because of course Victor followed the Japanese nationals, and was crushed when Yuuri failed to qualify for worlds) skate his routine better than he did.
And so Victor sees the boy who chewed his heart up and spit it out, and thinks I have to go to him.
//
Victor Nikiforov is in his home. Victor Nikiforov is in his home. Victor Nikiforov is in his home .
Holy shit.
After having confirmed that he is not having an extended lucid dream or incredibly vivid hallucinations, Yuuri dares to venture out to the living space to find Victor sprawled out on the tatami mats, looking like he rolled out of a Vogue magazine.
He’s awestruck maybe, and still a little in shock, and maybe a little bit insanely happy when Victor takes one bite of Katsudon and exclaims “Vkusno!”
Then Victor tears him a new one: “Little piggy can’t go on the ice until he drops some weight!” He exclaims in that ridiculously cheerful voice. And Yuuri learns that Victor is kind of an asshole.
The asshole statement is further proven when Yurio shows up: “You’re both far more mediocre than you think you are!” Again with that heart shaped smile like he didn’t completely obliterate what little smithereens of Yuuri’s self-confidence was left. Yuuri doesn’t need anyone to tell him he’s completely and totally average; he knows that, thanks.
But...when the fiasco that is the Onsen on Ice competition is over, Yuuri discovers that Victor is also exceedingly kind. He discovers the parts of Victor that are hidden from the media. Underneath the playboy persona and the flirty winks and perfect hair is the Victor that loves Makkachin more than anything and the Victor who loves trying new Japanese food and is open to all kinds of cultures. But also, the Victor that is sad when he’s alone, in secret, hidden away from the rest of the world. The Victor whose face goes so completely blank that it’s kind of scary, when he thinks no one is paying attention to him. The Victor who has such beautiful blue eyes, the wonderfully beautiful and sad, sad eyes. The Victor, who Yuuri begins to suspect—could maybe understand how lonely he feels sometimes, maybe better than anyone. It breaks his heart a little, because Yuuri’s not called Katsuki Glass Heart for nothing, but it also breaks his heart a little when he realizes that however imperfect and sad and lonely Victor might be in real life, Yuuri might just lo—no, it’s too early to say that word.
But your feelings are still real even if you don’t admit them.
And Victor is so kind and wants to be whatever Yuuri wants him to be but Yuuri just wants Victor to himself, only ever himself. And Victor tells him, “Yuuri, you’re not weak—no one else thinks that either,” and Yuuri almost wants to cry because he’s needed to hear that for a really long time. And this conversation isn’t really doing anything for Yuuri’s feelings because Victor’s face is right there and his lips are so pink and Yuuri wants to kiss him—Yuuri stops that train of thought right there and pulls away and convinces himself that he imagined that flicker of disappointment in Victor’s eyes.
And under his bed covers, late at night, Yuuri realizes he’s happy . And he maybe feels more at home than he ever has in Hasetsu.
//
Victor is twenty-seven and so unbelievably happy that it feels too good to be true.
It is.
“Let’s end this.”
And Victor can’t hear the rest of what Yuuri says because his ears are ringing and his heart is breaking and his tears are leaking out— oh shit. He hasn’t cried in front of anyone since he was sixteen but of course it would be Yuuri, Yuuri has Victor wrapped around his little finger and doesn’t even know it.
And it’s unbelievable that only yesterday Yuuri put a ring on his finger and made him the happiest person alive, probably—he knows that Yuuri is disappointed that he didn’t do as well as he wanted to in his short program, but he’s not worried, he’s learned to have more faith in Yuuri than he does himself and fully expected him to make a full comeback in his free skate. But apparently, Yuuri was upset enough to decide to retire—oh wait, he’s been planning this from the beginning—that makes it even worse somehow. And apparently Yuuri also changed his mind within a day and they’re going from engaged to complete strangers now that Yuuri doesn’t want him to be his coach or fiancé anymore— shit, fuck, he can’t stop crying.
It’s almost unfathomable that Victor’s going to have to give this up—give up the one person who makes him feel at home, but he’s learned long ago that Yuuri is an immovable object when he’s made up his mind.
They’ll decide tomorrow, after the Grand Prix Final. Victor goes to sleep with tears in his eyes.
//
Yuuri is twenty-four years old and a silver medalist in the Grand Prix Finals. One year ago, he was twenty-three and had come dead last.
He can’t even bring himself to be too disappointed about the fact that he was this close to gold, because he’s so proud of Yurio, and now he’s going to keep skating and stay by Victor’s side, always.
He realized on the ice that he doesn’t want this to end, doesn’t it want it to be over—so why should it be? He can’t believe that he was about to let the two things that he loves most in life slip through his fingers—skating, and Victor. Because Victor might be a little too sad sometimes, a little broken—but aren’t they all? And Yuuri loves him all the more for it, loves every part of him, even the broken bits, the parts of him that are empty, wants to fill all the empty space up with his love, so that Victor’s overflowing with it, so that he never feels broken or sad again. (And Yuuri’s no fool—he knows he’s not going to magically fix Victor—but as far as he’s concerned, Victor doesn’t need fixing, he just deserves someone who’s willing to try and make him the happiest person he can be.)
“I just wanted you to be happy,” he murmurs that night, into Victor’s hair, his arms wrapped around him protectively.
Victor tilts his head up at that, meets Yuuri’s eye and quirks an eyebrow—“by taking away the one thing that makes me happy?”—and oh, Yuuri feels like he’s been sucker punched because he’s suddenly out of breath.
He can’t believe that he was about to let the one person who felt like home to him go, just like that. Because that’s what Victor is—his home. Kissing him in China had felt like coming home after a lifetime away and running into his arms after the Rostelecom Cup had felt like running home after running from himself his whole life. And Yuuri’s just learning—that home doesn’t have to be a place, that he loves Detroit and Hasetsu in their own ways, but they’re not home to him anymore—that home can be a person, and his home is Victor.
//
Victor is twenty-nine today, and the sun is shining through the blinds into his apartment. His apartment that never felt like home, even with Makka, even with his own decor—until Yuuri had moved in.
He blinks a few times and finds himself reaching for the warm body next to him—and it’s not there. At that, he sits up, rubbing his eyes. Yuuri almost never wakes up before him. Between them, Victor is the happy morning person, almost aggravatingly cheery at five in the morning, and Yuuri is the night owl. Sometimes, Victor finds himself waking up at three in the morning to find Yuuri still on his phone beside him in bed, and then demands that he turn it off and cuddle with him, because “as your coach, Yuuri, I can’t allow this kind of unhealthy behavior,” to which Yuuri will grumble but he feels him smile against his skin. However, this means that Yuuri is a nightmare to wake up in the morning for training, usually only willing to wake up with promises of black coffee waiting for him, and even then, only starts acting like a real person after ten.
So that makes it even odder: where is Yuuri? For a second, Victor feels himself panicking because Yuuri’s not the only one with his own anxieties and every time Yuuri’s gone maybe he changed his mind and maybe he finally realized that I’m not good enough, I’m not who he thinks I am . Because maybe he won’t admit it, but he’s still afraid people are going to leave him, the people he cares about most in the world. (Like his mother.) But he’s learned to tame the fears more and more because Yuuri shows him every day in the little things (and the big things) that he loves him and he’s going to stay by Victor’s side, no matter what.
It’s at that second that Yuuri walks in through the bedroom door, toting a large tray with Makkachin trailing behind him.
“Aw, you already woke up.”
“I—Yuuri, what is this?” Victor asks, incredulous.
Yuuri plops the tray down on Victor’s lap gently and kisses his cheek. “I wanted to surprise you, the way you’re always surprising me,” Victor blushes at that, even after all this time, “Happy Birthday, Vitenka. I love you.”
“I love you too, солнышко,” Victor breathes, wide eyed, choked up, and trying to ignore the pressure behind his eyes. No one’s ever done anything like this for him before. No one’s cared enough or loved him enough to take care of him like this, to love him in the way that he needed to be loved.
Yuuri leaves and returns just as quickly, with an enormous bouquet of blue roses which he brandishes to Victor with a flourish, a light blush over his cheeks. “For you.”
“For me?” Victor laughs, disbelieving and awestruck that this is his fiancé and they’re going to get married in two months and oh they’re so in love.
Yuuri sits down on the bed beside him and gestures to the tray, “Eat up.”
Victor looks down at the waffles, the omelet, the toast, the bacon, the syrniki (his heart aches a bit at that), and orange juice, all of it practically overflowing out of the tray.
Yuuri watches him almost nervously as he takes a bite of the syrniki and exclaims, “Vkusno!” He quickly eats the rest of it and a bite of omelet, feeding Makka a bit of bacon as he chews.
Yuuri looks incredibly relieved, “Oh good, I had to get Yurio’s help with that—turns out his grandfather is good with more than just piroshki—he did make a bag of it for you though, it’s in the kitchen,” Yuuri smiles sheepishly.
“солнышко, you didn’t have to do all this—“
“I did. I love you and I wanted to do it for you, okay? You’re doing things for me all the time, I...I wanted to show you how much I love you.” Yuuri says firmly, still blushing.
And oh shit, Victor’s really going to cry now, he can feel the tears leaking out. But this time, Yuuri just smiles and brushes the tears away instead of his hair, like that one night in Barcelona that they don’t talk about. Victor turns his head up for a kiss, and Yuuri indulges him.
“I have your gift, it’s right outside, I’ll give it to you later.”
Victor has Yuuri’s gift too, because Yuuri might act like Victor’s birthday is the most important part of the day, but Victor knows that he loves Christmas, gets almost giddily excited about it, like a little kid. He thinks it’s adorable.
“Don’t need anything else, this is more than enough, you’re more than enough, love you so much, you’re all I need,” Victor mumbles against Yuuri’s mouth, and oh good, Yuuri’s ears are red now, he’s so endearing and so beautiful , and every word he said was true, he loves Yuuri so much that sometimes he doesn’t know what to do with all his love.
Yuuri’s hand comes around to hold the base of his neck, tenderly, and says, “I love you too, you big sap,” and Victor feels his heart swell.
Because Victor’s spent his whole life trying to get back home, and now, here, with Yuuri and Makka and so much love around him he’s practically overflowing, Victor’s finally found his home.