The Depth of Green

Epilogue: Part Two

Epilogue: Part One recap: Yuri has a lot of anxiety. We meet Jean. Otabek is wonderful. That's it. xD

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Eleven months later
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Yuri oscillated on the pavement in front of the rental car, gloved hands twisting and already-chapped lips being gnawed upon. His hair flew in the wind around him, as he had long grown accustomed to its freedom entailing his occasional whipping in the face, and he leveled an anxious, slightly manic glance at Otabek.

"We don't even know if he lives here anymore. He might not be home -- might not even be alive -- and maybe he doesn't want to be bothered? It's possible he doesn't want to see me; it's been so long and--"

"Yura." One hand took his, ceasing the nervous twisting.

Yuri sucked in a breath. He let it out. "I--" he swallowed. Nodded. "It'll be okay."

Otabek gave him a small, warm smile. Squeezed his hand.

And then there were boots crunching over long-frozen snow, stepping right over the patch of ice that always formed in winter, and marching up the dilapidated little brick steps. The doorbell rang, tinny and low as it always had been. And from the inside, came the rough resonance that signaled the wooden picture frame located just next to the doorbell speaker was still there.

Yuri breathed.

Otabek breathed.

The snow, seemingly, caught on the wind and swirling about in the wintery air, breathed.

Footsteps shuffling on the other side of the door, and how did lungs work?

The door, faded, wooden-paint long worn-off, still dented in one corner from when Yuri had tried to skateboard up the porch railing and failed, cracked open. And suddenly, too suddenly, suddenly enough that Yuri didn't think he'd ever be able to breathe again, he was face to face with the grizzled, weather-beaten features of Nikolai Plisetsky.

They both simply stared for a moment, before, hoarse and wet and deep as his voice always had been, "Yuratchka..."

Yuri threw himself at him, temporarily heedless of his bad back, of Otabek standing just behind him in the cold and the sleet and the snow, and simply held him. It had been so long. So, so long. He'd never thought he'd see him again, and now here he was.

They wept in each other's arms.

"Yura," Nikolai's old, wrinkled, arthritic hand cupped Yuri's cheek, doubtlessly ice cold as it was, and wiped his tears. He touched him as though he were precious, some phantom or angel or apparition that would fade if he only handled him too roughly.

Yuri laughed hoarsely, the sound caught somewhere in his throat between the sobs and absolute euphoria threatening to overwhelm him. "Deda," he murmured, and buried his face in his shoulder, though he had to stoop and slouch to make it work. "You're still here--"

"Of course I'm still here," the old man huffed, but tears slid unchecked into his beard, so Yuri wrote his irritation off as a farce. "I'm not yet old enough not to be able to fight off the tax collector."

Yuri laughed again, and only released his grandfather when he heard a quiet, whimpery, thoroughly indignant squawk from behind him.

It was the only thing in the world that could've gotten him to turn around, and he did so instantly, gently extricating himself from his grandfather's arms to hold them out to Otabek.

"She's alright, just fussing," Otabek said, though he handed her over all the same.

An audible gasp from behind them, and Nikolai stared at the bundle of blankets and baby-winter-coats in Yuri's arms.