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Sleeping in the same bed as Victor is a nightmare.
During the day, at least, he can somewhat control his aura. Sure, the air around him is still cold, but at least it’s bearable. It’s very different at night. Without Victor actively controlling his aura, the entire bed is ice cold – and that’s on a good day. Sometimes, when he’s dreaming, Victor actually makes it snow.
Yuuri’s lost track of how many times he’s woken up in the middle of the night with a thin layer of snow covering him like a second blanket. It didn’t really bother him at first – hell, he’d even go so far as to call it endearing – but lately he’s been waking up with a runny nose too much for his liking.
The night he gets shocked awake by Victor’s frigid feet pressing against his, cold enough to bite even through the thick socks Yuuri is wearing, is the night Yuuri finally decides he’s had enough. He waits until morning breaks and Victor is awake enough to understand words before taking a seat next to him at the kitchen island. A cheerful tone rings through the air when he does so, but Yuuri is so used to it by now he barely even notices anymore.
He takes a swig of coffee for courage, then says, “I think we should sleep in separate beds.”
Victor freezes with his own mug half-way to his mouth.
“N-not that I don’t want to sleep with you!” Yuuri hastens to correct himself. “I do want to. I mean—” A blush creeps up his neck. Victor is still frozen in place, which only worsens Yuuri’s embarrassment. “I still want to sleep in the same bed as you. I just can’t.”
Slowly, Victor lowers his arm. He’s shaking a little; the mug clatters against the coaster when he sets it down. “Why?” His voice is perfectly void of emotion, his face just as blank when he turns to meet Yuuri’s eyes.
Flustered, Yuuri runs a hand through his hair. The cheerful hum that accompanies the movement doesn’t belong in this setting. Not for the first time, Yuuri wishes he could turn his ability off at will. Supposedly, there are some people who can do that, though Yuuri has yet to meet any.
The silence stretches on for some time as Yuuri tries to find the right words to explain. Everything he can think of sounds wrong, somehow. Finally, when the tension builds up too much, he just blurts out the first thing that comes to mind:
“It’s too cold.” Real smooth, Yuuri thinks to himself. “In bed. At night. It’s too cold.” God. He could hit himself.
He’s gotten the message across, though, if the way Victor draws his eyebrows together in a frown is anything to go by. His lower lip sticks out in a pout – Yuuri sort of wants to kiss it, but he figures now isn’t really the time. “I thought you didn’t mind the cold?”
Yuuri looks down at his lap; he can’t bring himself to look at Victor. He wrings his hands together nervously. It’s become a bit of a habit; whenever he feels nervous, he’ll find some way to touch his engagement ring to calm down. “It didn’t, not at first. Long term, though…” He trails off, once again at a loss for words.
“Yuuri,” Victor says, softly, tenderly. He grabs both of Yuuri’s hands with one of his own, holding them still. As usual, he’s absolutely freezing. It’s a little jarring, but Yuuri forces himself not to react to the cold. “Yuuri,” Victor repeats, when Yuuri still won’t look at him.
It’s not that Yuuri is afraid of speaking his mind; he’s afraid that, if he looks at Victor, he’ll decide he can stand the cold a little while longer.
An ice cold finger slips under his chin and pushes his head up. He’s forced to look Victor in the eyes – Victor, who looks like he does right before Yuuri has to go on the ice, like he knows everything that is bothering him and he wants nothing more than to take care of it for him. “It’s unhealthy to crop things up, you know?” The words themselves aren’t that special; it’s the unspoken meaning behind those words that causes a dam to break inside of Yuuri. His thoughts spill out of him like a waterfall:
“I’ve been getting sick, lately. I think it’s because I keep sleeping in the cold – your cold, I guess. Not that I blame you for anything! I know you can’t help it. If there was a way for – for the cold to stop bothering me, I wouldn’t even have suggested this, but I have to think about my health – about my career. I can’t win gold this season if I keep missing out on practice because I’m sick.” As soon as he stops speaking, Yuuri’s face blooms a bright red. He’s embarrassed at his outburst, but he’s not about to take any of it back.
Victor trails his thumb over the back of Yuuri’s hand. Yuuri shivers, but not because of the cold. “I’ll really miss you if we can’t sleep together anymore,” Victor pouts, “but I suppose it’s for the best.”
Yuuri breathes a sigh of relief, when:
“Will you still sleep in my bed after we have sex?”
Yuuri pulls his hands from Victor’s grip and inhales sharply. He ends up choking on air and spends several seconds coughing uncontrollably. Once his lungs stop attempting to escape his body, he buries his face in his hands and groans, “Victor.”
“Is that a yes?” Victor asks, either oblivious to Yuuri’s distress or willfully ignoring it. “It’s a yes, right? Yuuri?”
Instead of dignifying that question with an answer, Yuuri gets up and walks away. He doesn’t even care that he’s leaving his coffee behind; caffeine is no match for pure mortification when it comes to waking him up.
*
Mila corners him while he’s taking a break from practice. She glides over to Yuuri and leans over the side of the rink, smiling in a way that sets his fight or flight instinct firmly to flight. “If you and Victor break up-”
Yuuri chokes on air for the second time that day. Dignity be damned, he should have ran away the second he noticed Mila was heading his way.
“-will you go back to Japan?” She continues talking like nothing happened, but the way the ever-present glow around her becomes a little brighter betrays her delight. “Because I don’t think Yuri will let you. He won’t admit it, but he enjoys having you around.”
“Wha- really?” Yuuri demands. Sure, he’s noticed that Yuri has become slightly less hostile towards him, but he didn’t think—
Wait. That isn’t the point. “Victor and I aren’t breaking up. Why would you even think that?”
Mila raises an eyebrow. “He’s only been sobbing on Georgi’s shoulder for the past hour.” She points a thumb over her shoulder, towards the other end of the rink, where, indeed, Victor is practically draped over Georgi. He’s saying something – Yuuri catches the words 'abandoned' and 'alone' – while Georgi pats his head in a futile attempt to console him.
“Did you really not notice?” Mila’s eyes are wide in astonishment. “Like, not at all?”
Yuuri shakes his head mutely, too absorbed in watching Victor to give more of a response than that. He’s spent enough time with Victor to know when he’s genuinely upset and when he’s just being dramatic. This, while there is definitely some genuine emotion behind it, is mostly him putting on a show.
“Seriously? Not even when he laid down on the ice and told Yakov to ‘end his suffering’?”
That gets Yuuri’s attention. He can get away with ignoring most of Victor’s moods, but there comes a point where he needs to step in. “Victor did what now?”
“Yeah,” Mila twirls a strand of hair around her finger in a show of casualness, but it does nothing to hide the smirk slowly spreading on her face. “He was lying there for a good ten minutes. Didn’t get up until Yuri threatened to just skate over him.”
“Okay.” Yuuri drags a hand over his face. “Okay. This has gone on long enough.” He skates towards the corner of the ice where Victor is still hanging over Georgi, the ever-present music that accompanies him swelling to something appropriately dramatic.
He comes to an abrupt halt right in front of them, causing some ice to spray up over Victor and Georgi’s feet. “Victor,” he hisses, “what are you-” He pauses just in time to remember that Georgi is, in fact, present and listening to all of this, staring wide-eyed at him, and turns his head minutely to meet his eyes. “Could you let me talk to my fiancé alone for a moment?” Yuuri asks with a calm he doesn’t feel.
“I-” Georgi hesitates, looking at Victor’s teary eyes. Then he meets Yuuri’s steely gaze again and nods. “Of course. I wouldn’t want to get caught up in a lovers' quarrel.” He skates away then, leaving Victor to catch himself on Yuuri’s shoulder, lest he fall flat on his face.
“Yuuri! You’re here!” he says brightly, attempting to wrap his arms around Yuuri’s waist. His attempts are halted when Yuuri catches his wrists and holds them in place between them.
“Victor. I would… appreciate it,” Yuuri says, softly, trying to keep his voice under control. He doesn’t get angry at Victor often, but this is one of the few times he’s crossed the line. “If you didn’t lay out our love-life for all to see.”
Victor pouts adorably. It’s almost enough for Yuuri’s resolve to break. Almost. “But, Yuuri-”
“Your whining is hardly as alluring as you think it is,” Yuuri interrupts whatever Victor was about to say. He takes strange delight in watching his façade of desperate, heartbroken lover crumble. “Can you actually go back to coaching me now? I’d hate to have to stay late because somebody neglected to do their job.”
The threat of getting to spend less time with Yuuri does the trick. Victor straightens up, wiping away tracks on his cheeks left behind by fake tears. “Alright. Let’s practice some quads, shall we?”
*
That night, Yuuri piles a bunch of blankets on the couch and settles in to sleep. He ends up kicking most of the blankets off, which is refreshing; when he sleeps in the same bed as Victor, he needs all the blankets he can get.
He wakes up when Victor enters the living room in the morning, not because of the noise he makes, but because of the rush of cold air that follows him in.
“Good morning,” he greets, sitting up on the couch and rubbing his eyes. He grabs his glasses from the side table next to the couch. After he puts them on, he can see that Victor has dark stains beneath his eyes. With some trepidation, he asks, “How did you sleep?”
Predictably, Victor immediately takes the chance to complain. “Terribly! Oh, Yuuri, the bed is so empty without you. I was so lonely, I couldn’t sleep at all. I wish you’d come back and sleep with me.”
Yuuri feels guilt stir up inside of him at Victors words. He’s being selfish; putting his own desires before Victor and leaving him to suffer. He’s almost ready to give in and agree to share Victor’s bed again, but then he thinks of his own night’s sleep – the best he’s had in weeks. “It’s not that bad, right? You have Makkachin in bed with you.”
“I suppose,” Victor sighs. He eyes Yuuri over critically, likely searching for signs that Yuuri couldn’t sleep either. “How did you sleep?”
“Great, actually.” Another wave of guilt sweeps through him as he says this, but it’s assuaged somewhat when Victor smiles at him.
“Well, I suppose I’ll just have to learn to live with it. It’s what’s best for my precious Yuuri, after all.”
A wave of relief washes over Yuuri, so intense he practically launches himself at Victor on a kiss. Unexpectedly, it stirs something inside of him, leaving him panting when he pulls away. “You know,” he whispers, “we won’t have to worry about where I sleep after sex if we just…” He becomes too embarrassed to finish the sentence, trailing off awkwardly as a blush spreads across his face. “You know.”
“Now?” Victor asks, an excited glint in his eyes, which brightens even more when Yuuri nods. Little ice crystals form in his hair, something that usually happens when his emotions run high. “We’ll be late for practice.”
“Yeah, I know,” Yuuri says, then kisses him again.
They do end up being late for practice, but Yuuri can’t really be bothered to care.
*
That would have – should have been the end of it, except then Yuuri’s body goes and betrays him.
A couple of weeks after he starts to sleep on the couch, he starts waking up in the middle of the night again. It’s not because of the cold this time, nor is it caused by something mundane, like the couch being uncomfortable. No, what wakes him up is the loud music he causes when he’s twisting and turning in his sleep.
He used to have this problem when he was younger; he’d be worried about something, and be restless enough that he’d keep moving even while he was sleeping. It usually went away when he talked about what was bothering him, but Yuuri can’t really think of anything that’s bothering him right now. Even if he could, the person he’d usually talk to about these things is Victor, and he’s not about the tell him about his trouble sleeping; he’ll just insist it’s because Yuuri is lonely without him too, and then Yuuri will probably agree and go back to sleeping in the cold.
At first, he resolves to just ignore it, but when he wakes up in the middle of the night for the fourth time in a row he admits he has to do something about it.
Yuuri doesn’t know very many people willing to listen to him prattle on about his problems, let alone any who’d be awake at this time of night. Maybe it’s his sleep addled brain that makes him think this is a good idea, but Yuuri eventually settles on calling the one person he knows who makes a habit of going to sleep late, even though it’s doubtful he’ll want to listen to Yuuri complain. Still, it’s worth a try.
“What?” Yuri barks when he picks up the phone. Almost immediately, Yuuri regrets calling him.
Yuuri swallows to gather courage, then presses on regardless. “I need your help.”
On the other side of the line, Yuri makes an irritated noise. “It can wait ‘till morning. Go the hell to sleep, fatso.”
“I can’t!” Yuuri shouts, before Yuri can hang up. He shoots a worried glance at the door to Victor’s bedroom, but there are no signs indicating his shout has woken Victor up. Lowering his voice, Yuuri continues, “That’s exactly what I need your help with. I can’t sleep.”
Yuri sighs heavily, but he doesn’t hang up. “This is about you and Victor sleeping in separate beds, isn't it?”
Yuuri winces. He still hasn’t gotten used to everybody he knows knowing all of his private business. “Maybe? I’m not sure.” It’s the most likely cause, though he doesn’t want to admit it to himself. “I’ve just been getting restless in my sleep.”
There’s a pause, long enough that Yuuri wonders if Yuri has hung up on him after all. Then, finally, “Both of you are idiots.” Another short pause. “Potya thinks so too.”
At a loss for words, Yuuri’s mouth opens and closes a few times in silence. Eventually he manages to ask, “He didn’t really say that, did he?”
“No.” Yuri says, but before Yuuri can feel too relieved he adds, “His exact words were ‘two love-struck fools who can’t even be bothered to talk to each other’, but that’s basically the same thing.”
Yuuri drops his face into his free hand. “I can’t believe I just got insulted by a cat,” He mutters.
“Look,” Yuri says, “I don’t know why the fuck you’re calling me about this, since it’s not my problem, but if you really want my advice, I think you should talk to Victor. He’s called me too, to complain about how lonely he is all alone in bed-” he makes a disgusted noise “-and I’m sick of having to listen to him. So you two had better talk it out.” There’s the faint sound of meowing after Yuri has finished talking. Vaguely, Yuuri wonders if he’s being insulted again.
“Potya says you need to ‘find the balance between what’s good for your body and what’s good for your soul’, whatever that means.”
“Wow,” Yuuri says, impressed. “Your cat is even wiser than you, Yuri.”
Yuri grunts. “Fuck off, pig,” he says, though there’s no real fire behind it. Before Yuuri can say anything else, he hangs up.
Yuuri throws his phone down beside him on the couch. His call with Yuri really only served to confirm the suspicions he already had; Victor isn’t the only one who’s lonely when Yuuri sleeps on the couch.
Still, he can’t just go back to sharing a bed with Victor. He’ll just get sick again. Like Potya said, he needs to find a balance.
Slowly, reluctantly, he gets up from the couch, gathers all his blankets in his arms and opens the door to Victor’s bedroom. He climbs into bed next to Victor, on the side that Makkachin isn’t occupying already, spreading the many layers of blankets over himself. Once he’s settled in, Victor blinks at him, obviously still half asleep. “Yuuri?” he questions, and Yuuri can’t help the fond smile that spreads over his face.
“Yeah. I decided I can sleep with you a couple nights a week.”
Victor hums happily, and moves over to wrap his freezing limbs around Yuuri like he’s some kind of human octopus.
Despite the cold, Yuuri sleeps like a baby that night.