The Depth of Green

Chapter 14

Chapter 13 recap: Can I just apologize? Poor Yuri. He doesn't deserve this bullshit. The poor baby wakes up minutes before a showing after passing out in his closet, and, only once he's outside, realizes he's not wearing blockers. Otabek is Very Obviously affected and Yuri think it's sweet. Later that night, Yuri works late to make up for lost time, and is raped by a guard. The chapter ends with Yuri at the showing the next day, visibly upset, and Otabek supports him even without knowing what's going on, holding his hand as Yuri breaks down.

I feel like I've lost all credibility, at this point. xD

~~~

Yuri... Yuri would've liked to say that he spent the weekend following his interaction with Fumihiro behaving perfectly normally. He really would have. But that just wasn't true.

He didn't know why this was hitting him so hard; for the past two years, life had never been what he wanted it to be and it only made sense that the more... carnal aspects of it followed that trend. He was pregnant and forsaken in a second matchmaking house, for God's sake-- he wasn't a stranger to intercourse, no matter how rough it came. And yet--

Perhaps it was the hormones, making him weepy over things as ridiculous as the way his yukata folded so neatly, at night. Perhaps it was something instinctual; it wouldn't surprise him to learn that in late term, omegas took what had been routine matters worse, concerned for their children. Perhaps he had simply gotten used to his perceived control over his own body during the five months or so he'd spent at the house without being subjected to anything more than gropings and lascivious taunts. Still.

Yuri was out of ways to lie to himself, too tired and too distressed to delude himself into thinking that a new trickle of fear didn't assault him every time a guard, no matter which, was near. It applied to alphas in general, he found when he shrank back from a matchmaker, that Monday, when she reached him in her inspection before the showing. The only person Yuri had retained normal contact with since-- since, was Otabek. And normal was a loose phrase.

A hand through the bars of a fence. That had been all it had taken for Yuri to, finally, wholly, drop his act. He wasn't the perfect little omega, the ideal mating candidate, anymore as he sobbed as quietly as he could into his palm, parasol held precariously between his knees and Otabek's hand locked in a vice-like grip. He wasn't the snarky, vaguely free Yuri he had played at around Otabek, quippy and full of contradictions in philosophical discussions, when he allowed himself to look into Otabek's eyes, nearly twenty minutes of soft reassurances later, and knew his own were red-rimmed, circled in the bruises of an insomniac, and overflowing with tears that showed no sign of relenting. He had given up, plain and simple. Maybe this was Yuri throwing himself to the winds; maybe it was Mila's old worries of his self-destruction being actualized; maybe he was simply losing his grasp of reality with his entire life crumbling around him. It didn't matter, when it came down to it.
And when it had come down to it, Otabek had held his hand, and let him cry. Yuri loved him for that.

"Plisetsky," Yuri hid his flinch the best he could, returning to reality at the sharp words of the matchmaker still examining him before the showing. Her eyes narrowed but she didn't comment on it, and Yuri worked on calming his pounding heart. "Stay back."

If Yuri hadn't been so focused on controlling his features, he would've blinked. Stay back? What the hell did that mean? He'd never seen that asked of anyone, before-- not in this house or his last.
Unwanted, dread rose inside him, coiling in his stomach like a snake, injecting the poison of terror into his bloodstream. Did she know? Was this about him forgetting his blockers? Had Otabek ratted him out?

No, Yuri internally scolded himself; Otabek wouldn't do that. He was too good for that.

So then what?