Yuri balanced the pack against his hip, even if it meant it ended up on only half of his body, and more at the top only for the balance point of placing the base away to get it to stay leaning on him when he lets go. His hands ending up against his ankle and the bed, while Victor is talking. While Victor is ... Yuri doesn't know quite what to call this.
There's something both soothing and irritating about it at the same time. Like Victor is trying to calm him down, or Victor is setting up a soft space for a hard landing. He doesn't know. He wants to know it's okay, some part of him clinging to those words in the first second, but being told it makes it seems so much worse, that it has to be said, that it just was. That Victor feels it has to be said to him. That there's some need to amend everything that's happening, too. Or how it did. Or ... something.
Yuri's fingers pull at the blanket a little, trying not to get distracted on the flash of Victor's smile, or the soft pain of recognition (of grief?) at the image he paints. The well-ordered and relaible pattern of an absolutely normal, that he's thought of a few times since they got back, but it doesn't even feel right to try and look back to his skate. What he remembers that he did wrong, whether to suggest they could just get one of their phones, or laptops, and watch it.
Feels like escaping. Feels like glossing. Feels tempting, and terrible, all at the same time.
Like Victor's first words. (He's not a coward. He isn't.)
He can't imagine what it is Victor would want to know about that's going on in his head. It feels like a ship being dashed this way and that. The longer he can think, the stronger the waves get. The want to say something -- along with the pressure of the several comments all about Victor wanting him to speak, say something, anything, that he's thinking -- just feels it's own version of suffocating. What was he even supposed to say now?
That if he looks at Victor for too long he forgets what he's thinking, and that at same time, if he looks at Victor for too long, he can't stop the disastrous spill of thoughts in every direction? That he's never not-known how beautiful Victor was, with all his posters, and being accosted with it daily this last year, but that looking at it, at him, head on, for what it is, he's blinding, and it's impossible to ignore, everywhere, like a flood lamp, and one that was shining just as blinding right at him?
That he wants to be so much closer to Victor than over here? That he wants to be able to reach out and touch Victor, again, already?
That he means that in the way where everything thing seems more solid, more real, when he is, and in the way, where everything tilts sideways, turns into warmth or fire or strange giddiness in hard waves, that is risking every certainty left? That he trusts Victor more than anyone he's ever known in all of his nearly-now twenty-four years, and that means he believes Victor when Victor says it's real, but believing it, refusing to truly doubt Victor beyond the space of his too-quick razor-sharp doubtful thoughts, doesn't mean it makes any sense either?
There's so much of it. All of it stuck under the top of his ribs, bumping into the cage of his ribs with every step, whisper, thoguht.
"I don't know what to say," Yuri says, quiet frustration there, and need. It wasn't as though that never happened, or even didn't happen often. It happened all the time. Especially about things that felt fragile or wrong or definitely came from all of this thoughts only circling around the worst answers possible, or all of his focus being on something that wasn't happening wherever they were at the time.
But it wasn't like this. It wasn't like staring at all the thoughts in his head, even the ones he could have made into words, would not have questioned, and having absolutely no clue what was worth saying, or what he could, or shouldn't, what was right, and what was wrong, where any of the lines and walls for anything were anymore.
no subject
There's something both soothing and irritating about it at the same time. Like Victor is trying to calm him down, or Victor is setting up a soft space for a hard landing. He doesn't know. He wants to know it's okay, some part of him clinging to those words in the first second, but being told it makes it seems so much worse, that it has to be said, that it just was. That Victor feels it has to be said to him. That there's some need to amend everything that's happening, too. Or how it did. Or ... something.
Yuri's fingers pull at the blanket a little, trying not to get distracted on the flash of Victor's smile, or the soft pain of recognition (of grief?) at the image he paints. The well-ordered and relaible pattern of an absolutely normal, that he's thought of a few times since they got back, but it doesn't even feel right to try and look back to his skate. What he remembers that he did wrong, whether to suggest they could just get one of their phones, or laptops, and watch it.
Feels like escaping. Feels like glossing. Feels tempting, and terrible, all at the same time.
Like Victor's first words. (He's not a coward. He isn't.)
He can't imagine what it is Victor would want to know about that's going on in his head. It feels like a ship being dashed this way and that. The longer he can think, the stronger the waves get. The want to say something -- along with the pressure of the several comments all about Victor wanting him to speak, say something, anything, that he's thinking -- just feels it's own version of suffocating. What was he even supposed to say now?
That if he looks at Victor for too long he forgets what he's thinking, and that at same time, if he looks at Victor for too long, he can't stop the disastrous spill of thoughts in every direction? That he's never not-known how beautiful Victor was, with all his posters, and being accosted with it daily this last year, but that looking at it, at him, head on, for what it is, he's blinding, and it's impossible to ignore, everywhere, like a flood lamp, and one that was shining just as blinding right at him?
That he wants to be so much closer to Victor than over here?
That he wants to be able to reach out and touch Victor, again, already?
That he means that in the way where everything thing seems more solid, more real, when he is, and in the way, where everything tilts sideways, turns into warmth or fire or strange giddiness in hard waves, that is risking every certainty left? That he trusts Victor more than anyone he's ever known in all of his nearly-now twenty-four years, and that means he believes Victor when Victor says it's real, but believing it, refusing to truly doubt Victor beyond the space of his too-quick razor-sharp doubtful thoughts, doesn't mean it makes any sense either?
There's so much of it. All of it stuck under the top of his ribs, bumping into the cage of his ribs with every step, whisper, thoguht.
"I don't know what to say," Yuri says, quiet frustration there, and need. It wasn't as though that never happened, or even didn't happen often. It happened all the time. Especially about things that felt fragile or wrong or definitely came from all of this thoughts only circling around the worst answers possible, or all of his focus being on something that wasn't happening wherever they were at the time.
But it wasn't like this. It wasn't like staring at all the thoughts in his head, even the ones he could have made into words, would not have questioned, and having absolutely no clue what was worth saying, or what he could, or shouldn't, what was right, and what was wrong, where any of the lines and walls for anything were anymore.