Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/ works/11229219. Rating: Explicit Archive Warning: Underage Category: M/M Fandom: Yuri!!!_on_Ice_(Anime) Relationship: Victor_Nikiforov/Yuri_Plisetsky Additional Tags: Angst, Hasetsu, Frottage, This_fic_gave_me_trauma, Canon-Compliant, Abandonment_Issues, Victor_is_Problematic Stats: Published: 2017-06-18 Words: 2580 ****** Promise ****** by neuroglam Summary Yuri doesn’t know why he feels like he has to go—to drop everything and buy a ticket and a suitcase—until he’s on the plane to Japan. Notes As usual, this will get another edit in a couple of days, so if you're pickier about your writing, wait. Yuri doesn’t know why he feels like he has to go—to drop everything and buy a ticket and a suitcase—until he’s on the plane to Japan. Planes suck like that: dumb movies, iPhones not allowed—there’s nothing to do but sit still and think. And thinking blows. All kinds of crap comes up. Crap like watching his mom and her large canvass bag that she could barely lift on her way out the door, crying out that he doesn’t want her to go. The door as it closes; Yuri sniffling and burying his face in his grandpa’s hair. Crap like watching Victor wave at a pissed-off Yakov, and not even thinking of saying goodbye to Yuri before fucking off to fucking Japan. Yuri being mad—so mad—and at the same time, thinking, no, it can’t be, come back. Except Yuri’s one of those kids that’s being raised by his grandpa. He knows it can be, and he knows that shouting “come back” after someone is completely useless. The difference is, he never ran after his mom. Didn’t think to get on the plane to Moscow and wander the streets shouting her name, seething at everyone and everything, too scared of what would happen if he stopped. _____________________   Help from friendly Information staff at the airport gets him to Hasetsu. This part of the trip is better: he’s too busy trying to figure out where he’s going and what he should do to think about anything. It’s just the train that’s kind of bad, but Yuri’s still not thinking—not thinking as hard as he can. Sure, he’s angry—because Victor is still a fucking idiot—but he’s also proud of himself for completing his first international flight on his own. He steps out of the train station in Hasetsu, hoodie pulled low over his eyes, and for the first time, realises that he doesn’t know where to go. So he drags his suitcase through the streets of what, thank god, turns out to be a fairly small town, and shouts through the lump in his throat. At one point, on this road right next to the sea, he almost cries. Because as hard as he tries not to remember, he does—and not just Victor leaning down, hair falling over his eyes as he said, “I’ll choreograph your senior debut.” There’s the other promise, too. The one Yuri kept heating over and over again since the first time he cornered Victor in the locker room and burrowed his flaming face into his sweaty t-shirt. It’s another moment Yuri would always remember: Victor ruffling his embarrassing bowl-cut, his eyes half-moons and his mouth in that shape, saying, “You’re too young! What, do you want me to go to jail? Wait until you grow up, Yura!” So Yuri waits. Because he doesn’t want Victor to go to jail. He doesn’t ever want to do anything to really hurt Victor—even though he snaps at him and acts like a nuisance every time he feels like he can’t fit in his own skin. “Can I have a hug,” he’d ask Victor every now and then. And he’d find himself with an arm around his shoulder, of if there was no one around, plastered full-length against Victor’s body, head on Victor’s chest. It’s the best thing that’s ever happened to Yuri, hugging Victor. Yuri is never the first to let go. Alone at night, in his room, he’d think of what it would be like to be sixteen and to be able to hug Victor forever. Victor promised, Yuri would remind himself, and he’d fall asleep curled around his pillow. Except when Yuri finally finds Victor at the ice rink, Victor rubs the back of his neck and says, “Ehehe, did I? I forgot.” Then he says, “I want him to skate Eros.” His eyes are half-moons, his mouth is in that shape, and Yuri feels like he’s falling. Yuri clenches his fists and squares his shoulders. Because he has fallen and stood, and fallen, and stood, since he was six and fist got on skates. It’s in his bones by now: there’s no success without falling, and no medals without getting up and trying harder, ready for your next fall. So when Victor gives him Agape, Yuri gets up and doesn’t think—doesn’t think as hard as he can—about falling.   _____________   The fact of the matter is, Yuri thinks that night, curled up on the floor of his closet, that Yuri’s always been a child to Victor. A talented one, but still a child. Yuri may be getting there, Yuri may have potential, but Yuri’s time has never been now, it’s always later. “When you grow up.” In the future. When Victor looks at him, he sees a boy—even though Yuri is so much better than that snivelling Japanese loser. So Yuuri’s dog died in a car accident. Well, Yuri’s mom died in a car accident, too, when she was working in Moscow. Yuri didn’t snivel, he stood up. He skated. At training camp, he worked harder than anyone else, and got himself noticed by Yakov. He worked harder still, and made his mom proud. He knows he did. His grandpa said so. Yuri has done all of these things, done them side by side with Victor, but it's all expected, par for the course. None of this is a surprise, like when a fat pig skates your program.   _______________   The floorboards are cold under his feet and the air is chilly. Yuri wraps his thin Yuutopia robe tighter, his fingers clutching into the fabric, and tries to step light, to not make noise. There’s a ball in the pit of his stomach. His teeth grind. It’s cold, but it’s not just that: it’s the feeling of trying for a quad Axel when he's not supposed to; when it’s late at night at the rink and there’s no one to hold his harness so he knows that every time he tries, he'll end up falling. It’s the feeling of going to regular practice the day after, short on sleep and bruised, and skating like the bruises aren’t there. It’s the feeling of knowing full well that he's not sixteen, but even more, that being sixteen never mattered. That Victor would only blow him off, because the promises or the hugs were all a stupid joke so silly, childish Yuri would leave Victor alone. Yuri walks forward, even though he feels like he’s walking to his slaughter. When he reaches Victor’s bed, he can’t help but stop for a moment. Victor sleeps, one hand above his head. His mouth is slightly open. His hair is all over the pillow. Yuri looks at his neck, at his clavicles. Victor is wrong, Yuri thinks. Yuri isn’t a child. He doesn’t feel childish things when he looks at Victor—even though what he wants most of all is to hold him and be close. He closes his eyes and thinks about how nice it would be if Victor doesn’t wake up. If Yuri could just sneak in his bed, press himself close to Victor’s side, breathe in the smell that he knows from all their hugs… He wants to lick under Victor’s jaw. He wants to kiss his ear. Then he wants to kiss him all over: smell him, touch him, taste him. Hold him for as long as he can without Victor smiling at him with that smile and saying, “I’ll see you tomorrow, Yura, I need to go home!” And if Victor somehow wakes up, Yuri would put one hand on his cheek and say, “Shush, I’m not here. This is a dream, go back to sleep…” He doesn’t even need Victor to love him back, or to do anything. He just wants Victor to let him be close. Victor wouldn’t let him, Yuri knows. Victor never lets him. It’s always, “When you are sixteen; later; I need to go…” But it’s nice, standing next to Victor’s bed, to imagine what it would be like if Victor just… would. Something in the middle of Yuri’s chest hurts. He realises he’s put his hand there, for some reason. Yuri sighs. Right. Here comes. He unties his robe, feeling the chill as it pools around his bare feet, and takes a deep breath to steel himself. Ever-so-slowly, he straddles Victor. First one knee makes a dent in the mattress, then he needs to prop himself with a hand and shift his weight… Victor’s got on the same flimsy green Yuutopia robe, and it’s easy to push it aside so he can look at Victor’s leg. The leg is strong and muscled—and shaved—and has a mole, half-way on the right side. Yuri touches the mole with the tip of his finger. Slowly he bends over, his weight on his hands and knees so he doesn’t wake up Victor, and follows the finger with his nose—just touching the tip lightly to Victor’s thigh, breathing in as he moves upward. He pushes aside the robe. Victor’s dick is soft and pale against his thigh. Yuri raises himself up. He’s going to do it, he is—he decided that when he stepped out of his room tonight—but not yet. First, he’s just going to look for just a little more at what he wished could be his. Stay a little longer where he wished he were allowed. He should have been allowed, Yuri thinks. Victor has promised him. He’d promised. Yuri closes his eyes and exhales; bends down with his tongue flat, and licks. There’s no running away now, no scenario in which Victor just sleeps through this. Yuri bravely braces both of his hands on Victor’s thighs and takes his entire dick in, tugging gently. Then, again. Victor’s dick starts growing in his mouth, gets big and hard and a little weird-tasting, starts smelling like dick- Yuri reaches one of his hands between his legs as a larger, firmer palm grasps around his neck and Victor bucks up in his mouth. Yuri looks up from around his mouthful, meets the sliver of Victor’s eyes as they peer at him sleepily, but he doesn’t stop and neither does Victor. “Yura, come-” Victor swallows. “Come here,” he says and reaches out a hand. Yuri stops and climbs up, sitting on Victor’s legs before leaning forward over his chest. “I’m not a kid any more; I’m not, I’m not!” Yuri says and grinds their hard dicks together. Victor groans low in his throat and reaches for his ass; Yuri’s entire butt cheeks fit in his spread out hand. Victor’s fingers dig in and pull him forward, pressing them into each other as Victor takes over the rhythm, insistent and hard. This is when Yuri gives up; just collapses on Victor’s chest, face in the crook of Victor’s neck, and grinds against him until Victor kisses his forehead and their come mixes on their chests. They’re both panting, Victor’s hands resting on Yuri’s back now, but Yuri stays where he is. He can’t move. He won’t. “Please come back. Please.” He says next to Victor’s ear. Victor says nothing. “I’ll work hard; I’ll do whatever you want; I can be better…” Tears are rilling down his cheeks—and he didn’t cry when Victor left for Japan, he didn’t cry on his way here or when Victor gave Eros to that pathetic asshole, but he’s crying now, hiccoughing and choking. Victor looks at him, and for once his eyes don’t glint or mock. For once, it’s like Victor sees him. “There’s nothing you can do,” Victor says. Yuri’s eyes are squeezed tight. He shakes his head hard, side to side, as the tears keep falling. “Yura, look at me…” Victor puts a hand on his cheek. “There’s nothing you can do because I’m not leaving because of you. I’m leaving because of me.” Yuri sniffles and opens his eyes to look at Victor. He’s still breathing heavily, but at least he’s not choking on his own breath. “Nothing you can say can make my knees stop hurting. Or my back.” Victor says quietly, looking up at the ceiling. And yeah, Yuri knows about Victor’s knees—the way he knows that Georgi smokes pot on his days off and that Mila’s timing her birth control so she’s never on her period. The way he knows that Yakov is lonely, and that Victor respects him more than he lets on. Deep down, he knew, even before Victor left, that Victor’s smiles were turning hollow. That Victor was searching for something. “I don’t want to go to Worlds next year and get a fucking bronze,” Victor says. “I don’t want a fucking silver. Give me that, Yura, yeah?” Yuri remembers how he threw his phone and broke it when he got bronze on his first junior Euros. “You can still come back. You can-“ “I can nothing. At least, nothing of significance. I need coaching experience. If I come back now, I’ll be no good, to you or to anyone. Your career’s at a crucial stage; you need someone who knows what they’re doing.” “I’m better than him!” Yuri spits with his shoulders tense and his fists balled. A final try. He doesn’t say who he is. He doesn’t have to. “Yes, you are.” Victor states, and something about the certainty in his voice makes it not as bad. Yuri presses himself harder to his chest and clutches him for dear life. “Besides, you’re not sixteen yet,” Victor says, trying to joke, and pets his hair. “Fuck you,” Yuri chokes out and wants to strangle him. “Go back to Russia, Yura,” Victor says softly. “You’ll have Yakov. Yakov is good at what he does. There’s also his ex-wife—if he doesn’t call her in, tell me, and I will. You are good. You’ll be better than Yuuri, better than me—you’ve got it in you. Go back, Yura. Let me see you at the top of the podium with a GPF gold around your neck. Make me proud.” Yuri swallows. “And then I’ll be sixteen,” he says. “And then you’ll be sixteen.” Yuri raises himself on his hands and looks down at Victor—hopes his eyes burn through him so he won’t forget. “Promise me,” he says. “Fucking promise me, and keep your promise. That if I go back, you will.” Victor sighs and puts his palm on Yuri’s cheek again. “I promise,” he says, looking at Yuri in the eyes. Yuri nuzzles into his palm and sighs. For some reason, again, he’s started crying, so he wipes angrily at his cheeks before he straightens up, studying Victor’s face. He grinds his teeth. He squares his shoulders. He leans back down, and kisses Victor. Touches their lips together and feels their warmth and softness; forgets the hurt in the middle of his chest in the moment when Victor pulls him down with a hand on the back of his neck, and their tongues touch—and then Victor kisses him properly, with tongue, and for one short minute in which time stops, Yuri is happy. He kisses Victor, and he wants to kiss him forever. “Go, Yuri,” Victor whispers as he pulls back. Yuri closes his eyes, and nods. He will. He’ll return to Russia, and he’ll skate for as long and as hard as he has to. And he’ll make Victor proud. He knows he will. Victor said so. Please drop_by_the_archive_and_comment to let the author know if you enjoyed their work!