When he gets to the locker room, Yuri's nowhere to be found, but he's not hard to spot, once Victor heads towards the main hall: he's the one squirming under the too-close gaze and smothering figure of Christophe Giacometti.
A visual which, any other day, might amuse Victor –– Yuri, who blushes at the drop of a hat, and Chris, who has never met a boundary he didn't want to shatter –– but he doesn't need Chris intimidating his skater today, no matter how genial it might be. (Or how welcome a certain sequence of photos might suggest it is ... but then, he's been proven wrong on that count before.) "Chris!"
Lifting a hand in greeting as he saunters up, looking a little out of place, maybe, in his crisp suit among all the skaters in their warm-up gear, but he doesn't mind. "How's it going?"
Chris detaches –– there's really no better word –– from Yuri, and Victor's not surprised either by the way his tone drops into annoyance or how he appears to forget Yuri's there entirely, reaching to take Victor's ID badge and glancing at it with a scoff. "I'm not motivated without you."
Also nothing new: "You're always like that at the start of a season." Chris has been chasing him for as long as they've been skating together, and they've shared many a spotlight and podium together, but Chris has always viewed their rivalry far more seriously than Victor has. Being scolded for disappearing out from under him hardly comes as a surprise.
"Victor!"
Josef, with his red glasses and the same badge Victor's wearing. "Chris is right. He can't get serious without you."
Whether Chris can get serious at all is a better question, in Victor's mind, but that's hardly a politic thing to say, and, anyway, how do they expect him to respond to come back into the fold, anyway? Chris' career isn't dependent on Victor's, anymore than Yurio's or JJ's or Michele's are.
(There are times when he feels like the mechanical bunny released at the start of a dog race: just another unreachable goal for the others to try and catch.
And where's the inspiration in that?)
But there's no time to say anything, even if he found something less cutting and more appropriate, because he's being called again, and it is nice to see familiar faces and talk to them, even if they're all saying essentially the same thing: Come back. Why did you leave in the first place? Are you really a coach now?
The amused laughter following just split up with him, you know it won't last and don't you feel sorry for him? never touching the mildness of his smile, or his polite remarks.
It's not long now, and then Yuri will prove them all wrong, for both of them.
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Date: 2017-04-02 04:45 pm (UTC)A visual which, any other day, might amuse Victor –– Yuri, who blushes at the drop of a hat, and Chris, who has never met a boundary he didn't want to shatter –– but he doesn't need Chris intimidating his skater today, no matter how genial it might be. (Or how welcome a certain sequence of photos might suggest it is ... but then, he's been proven wrong on that count before.) "Chris!"
Lifting a hand in greeting as he saunters up, looking a little out of place, maybe, in his crisp suit among all the skaters in their warm-up gear, but he doesn't mind. "How's it going?"
Chris detaches –– there's really no better word –– from Yuri, and Victor's not surprised either by the way his tone drops into annoyance or how he appears to forget Yuri's there entirely, reaching to take Victor's ID badge and glancing at it with a scoff. "I'm not motivated without you."
Also nothing new: "You're always like that at the start of a season." Chris has been chasing him for as long as they've been skating together, and they've shared many a spotlight and podium together, but Chris has always viewed their rivalry far more seriously than Victor has. Being scolded for disappearing out from under him hardly comes as a surprise.
"Victor!"
Josef, with his red glasses and the same badge Victor's wearing. "Chris is right. He can't get serious without you."
Whether Chris can get serious at all is a better question, in Victor's mind, but that's hardly a politic thing to say, and, anyway, how do they expect him to respond to come back into the fold, anyway? Chris' career isn't dependent on Victor's, anymore than Yurio's or JJ's or Michele's are.
(There are times when he feels like the mechanical bunny released at the start of a dog race: just another unreachable goal for the others to try and catch.
And where's the inspiration in that?)
But there's no time to say anything, even if he found something less cutting and more appropriate, because he's being called again, and it is nice to see familiar faces and talk to them, even if they're all saying essentially the same thing: Come back. Why did you leave in the first place? Are you really a coach now?
The amused laughter following just split up with him, you know it won't last and don't you feel sorry for him? never touching the mildness of his smile, or his polite remarks.
It's not long now, and then Yuri will prove them all wrong, for both of them.