It's evening when they arrive back at Yu-topia, Viktor's eyes still squinted to keep the tears in. From the time they left the beach and walked back, all that's in his mind is the thought of Yuri leaving. It's an unfounded thought, an absurd one, and he's aware of that. Yuri's not going to leave.

It was just a dream.

He shakes his head to clear his thoughts just as someone asks him something, and he raises his head to look at a confused Yuri staring at him.

"You don't want katsudon?"

He realises Yuri's mother had asked what he'd want for dinner. He manages a small laugh and shakes his head once more.

"Of course I want katsudon."

Yuri smiles.

It's difficult to look at.

When two piping bowls of rice and delicious pork cutlet is presented in front of them, the smile appears again, this time a radiant one. Viktor can nearly see the glow of his face as the other digs in, glancing at him and beckoning him to eat as well.

Just watching Yuri eat would satisfy his hunger, but his stomach raises an eyebrow and whines for actual food in his system.

Well, it'll satisfy his quivering heart, at the very least.

The katsudon is good, as always, the specialty being Yuri's favourite. He suggests dipping into the onsen for a bit to relax, but Viktor weakly declines and pads off to his room, leaving Yuri standing in front of the back door in confusion.

He's had enough.

It's a huge relief to be away from everyone after a long day, despite the warmth he always feels in the house. The whole Katsuki family is a joy to be around, but it gets too loud and bright for him to handle.

He sits himself down on the bed and Makkachin joins him, sniffing at his clothes and licking at his face. He's sticky from the sweat that had accumulated when he was downstairs, trying to endure the too-warm atmosphere in the room, and so he drags himself off the bed to change.

He feels heavy.

It's a very uncomfortable feeling. Hanging onto his heart and refusing to let go, biting and tugging and pricking.

Why am I even feeling this way, he thinks as he pulls off his dirty clothes and dumps them on the floor next to him before digging through the closet for something he could wear for the night.

"Oh, never mind," he hisses in frustration before slamming the door shut and pulling on a pair of shorts. Besides, he's more used to sleeping half-naked, nothing strange about that.

His bed feels awfully empty as he sits back on it. Cold in the lower temperatures of the season, awfully cold. Dry, and freezing cold.

It's not like the ice they skate on. It's colder.

He doesn't know what to do with himself.

"Why am I even feeling this way?" he asks himself again, drawing imaginary circles on the sheets and letting his vision blur to just movie frames of what happened that afternoon.

It broke his heart to see Yuri sob that way, shoulders bobbing up and down, hearing the sharp inhales before another heart-wrenching sigh leaves his mouth. It broke himself even more that Yuri was consoling him, becoming confident, a different Yuri from before-

Then he realises.

He, as a coach, comforted and consoled by Yuri, made him cry, made the student he left the ice to protect cry.

That.

That couldn't be worse, could it?

He groans and slaps his hands over his face, digging his nails into his forehead, feeling the frustration build up all over again.

The dream he had the night before plays and replays in front of his eyes - Yuri's furrowed eyebrows and glaring eyes looking away, his skates giving way to cold, cold ice, audience screaming for him to stop, what if he's not even that good anymore-

A single laugh escapes his throat and he smiles to himself, a too-wide grin, squinted eyes fighting, and he laughs more.

How hilarious, he thinks, slapping his thigh as he rocks to and fro, slipping onto the floor because he's feeling way too weak to sit upright by himself.

"I'm such a failure," he whispers to Makkachin, who's sprawled on a mat on the floor.

The dog's fallen asleep, though, doesn't hear the suspicious tears in his voice to understand and leap onto him and comfort the skater.

"I let Yuri down, I made him cry, I made myself cry, I'm old, I'm hated, people's going to just stop watching, I'm a mess," he screams, his voice a quiet hiss, shouting to no one in particular, teeth gritted, holding back the urge to curse himself, slap himself senseless.

The tears flow free now.

He tries valiantly to mop his eyes up and go to sleep.

The bed, however, looks horribly wrong and empty.

He wipes his eyes, still unsettled and uncomfortable, and rocks himself again.

There's a rap on the door.

Viktor doesn't answer, just sits beside the bed, burying his face further into his hands so that when Yuri comes in he sees only the quivering body of the man he loves so much crouched on the ground.

He feels a hand on his shoulder and cracks an eye open to look at Yuri. He's furrowed his eyebrows.

"Viktor, what's wrong?" he asks.

Viktor tries to say something, that he's sorry, perhaps - he isn't sure himself - but all that comes out is a sigh.

"Are you all right?"

He lets out a wobbly laugh, but it's a major trigger point, and his carefully-built up wall of protection that prevents him from humiliating himself cracks when he sees Yuri's worried face. It's so innocent, so utterly beautiful, the one face he's come to love. It's unbearable.

"I don't know, am I?" he gabbles, willing the tears to just disappear into some nonexistent dimension, giving up when he glances at Yuri once more and lets his wall crumble into dust.

Yuri's shocked - what did he do to make Viktor start sobbing all of a sudden? Did his appearance do more harm than good? All he'd wanted was to check on Viktor.

"Viktor," he says, his hand reaching for his shoulders, just like how Viktor did to him when they were at the beach.

"Viktor."

The sound of his name being whispered to him over and over by the skater in front of him just makes him want to disappear even more than before. He tries to stop, hiccuping and hoping - hoping that it'll stop - and continues to let the disappointment in him blow about, throwing his thoughts all over the place, gritting his teeth as he sobs. He can't think.

In the end he just latches and clings onto Yuri, who wraps his arms around him, automatic. He rubs little circles on Viktor's back, breathing in the soft smell of his hair, holding him close.

He shushes him and Viktor can only cry harder. Again, it isn't like him to cry over something like a dream, but it has sparked a whole train of thought running wild through his mind.

Perhaps, he's been with far too little people to open up to anyone, not even his parents, that now, having Yuri by his side, all the bottled-up feelings have just poured out like an open tap.

All the frustrations of being at the top of the skating world, people hating him, people expecting him to surprise them, all the pressure - each just piles up on him.

No one cared about who I really was.

He sniffs, an attempt to calm himself down, and breaks down all over again.

But Yuri changed that.

He lifts his hands and claws at Yuri's shirt, grasping onto every bit of him he can find, because Yuri's the only person who cares.

Yuri's the only person who actually cares.

Yet, I made us both cry. Made him sad, had him console me - what sort of a coach am I?

A few minutes of sobs pass, and soon it's just tiny sniffs and the occasional hiccup. Yuri pulls away from Viktor and he grabs onto whatever of his shirt he can latch on.

"Y-Yuri?"

He smiles and pulls Viktor straight, going in for a hug, soundless, wordless. Viktor's so exhausted from the sudden breakdown that he simply hangs limp over Yuri's shoulder, barely garnering enough strength to pull his arms up to hold him.

They stay like this for a while.

It feels good. So much better. It's been a while since he's gotten the chance to cry everything out, the last being when he's just started out and the coach back then pushes him to do jumps he's never gotten used to doing.

It's different now, though.

He's got Yuri by his side.

When they finally pull apart, Yuri smiles into Viktor's eyes and helps him up, onto his bed. It's hard to cooperate, but he tries, and soon they're both on the sheets.

Now it doesn't feel as cold, or empty, as before.

Yuri wraps his arm around Viktor as they lie together in silence, staring at the ceiling.

"Want to talk about it?"

"Mm."

Viktor stays quiet for a bit, pushing down the stutters and sniffles and thinking of a way to tell the man beside him the fears, the frustrations.

Sometimes, not all feelings can be put into words. Especially sorrow stemming from terror, unfounded and wild thoughts.

"I-I made you cry," he finally says. "I made us cry. I'm a bad coach. I made you cry, then had you console me. What sort of a coach am I to his student?"

That's all he can manage before he takes a deep breath to calm his nerves, which are threatening to push the floodgates once more.

Yuri places his other arm around Viktor's neck and pulls his face towards him, bright cerulean eyes meeting syrup-brown ones. They're so close now, their noses are touching.

"You have all the right to cry, Viktor," he tells him, bumping his forehead against the other's. "You're a human, and I love you, so you don't have to worry. You're not a bad coach."

Viktor doesn't know what to do with his arms, so he pulls Yuri's hand away from his neck, laces their fingers together, and wraps the other arm around Yuri's waist. It's sort of comfortable this way.

"I'm not?"

"You're not my coach, anyway."

He's sure Yuri isn't finished yet, but the sentence still sends a shockwave through him, sends his heart racing. Not his coach?

"You're more than just my coach - my soulmate, the one I truly love."

Well. That's a relief.

Yuri smiles, a soft, gentle smile, and leans forward to press his lips against the other's.

It's not like the kiss they had when they were at the China Cup - intense, deep, spontaneous, shocking - this time, it's warm, the feelings mixing together till they're one, one single entity, one. He can feel the other start, before melting into it and drawing him closer.

"So, y-you love me?" Viktor asks when they pull away, his face unreadable, though Yuri spots the sparkle in his eyes.

"I love you."

"You love me."

"I love you."

"I love you too."