Gold, love and mint tea (Yuzuru Hanyu )

Prologue VI: Bring the pain

"That works! I did it!" he calls out to catch my attention.

"I told you it would work if you bend your knee when you reach for your foot!" I point out happily as he makes his way back to me. I've been sitting on the boards for the last hour, my feet dangling over the ice, watching my friends rehearse for the gala. Once again I wore my converse instead of something warmer but at least I wore my thickest sweatpants. The rink is beautiful, lights turned off with only pink and orange colored projectors lighting the place up.

"How did you know that I was doing it wrong?" he inquires, reaching for his water bottle.

"I saw you do it twice yesterday" I shrug as he sips his water.

"But how did you know my mistake?" he questions further, passing me the water "You have to know how to look to see it"

"I guess most skaters only notice their own mistakes by feeling them, and not all of them can even do that. But I'm trained to look for mistakes. We review videos of ourselves and other skaters to look for the mistakes we make. That's why I see obvious mistakes in your spins." I explain "Plus I passed a basic coaching license this year".

"Do you want to coach?"

"No, I don't think so... I really don't like small kids and I'm not patient enough. You?"

"I don't know..." he admitted "I only want to skate"

"I know... Hey why don't you try a Bielmann?" I mused.

"What? Do you think I can do it?" he grins.

"Yeah! You're flexible enough!"

He nods before backing away from me and after doing a few crossovers he goes into a regular upright spin before shifting into an awkward layback position trying to catch his foot, failing miserably of course, before somehow ending up on his ass.

"Well you're not that flexible!" I mock him "You're not going to be able to catch your foot this way and besides your right shoulder is way more flexible. You need to do it from a back camel entry same as the donut but instead of staying parallel to the ice pull your foot up!" He obeys and does exactly as I instructed him. It's not perfect but not bad for a first try. He looked at me in disbelief, a proud smile plastered on his face. "Well you're gonna have to work on that one but not bad!" I giggle as he approaches me.

"Thank you" he nods "I might even include it in my program"

"Yeahhh you might not wanna do that yet" I nudge him slightly "Hey I think some people want you to join them" I say pointing towards Adelina and the rest of the crowd.

"It's okay I'll stay with you"

"No! Go have fun. I'll be fine here, you need to enjoy this" I reassure him. He hesitates before flashing me a smile and skating off to join everyone. I watch them have fun together melancholically, wishing I could be out there too. I watch them rehearse the opening of the gala, jump and spin together, I watch Yuzuru waltzing with Yulia and Adelina (who seemed to be a big fan). But when he looks back at where I'm siting he'll see that I'm no longer there.

~

I sigh in frustration, removing my left skate and tossing it to the side before grabbing the right one. When was the last time I put on my left skate first? I always put the right one first, it's automatic at this point! I lace up my skate, annoyed at the fact that my phone keeps going off. I finally reach for it unlocking it angrily. As if taping it like a mad woman will make it shut up. I open the messages app, seeing that they're all from Yulia.

Yulia💕
- Hey where did you go?
14:34

- Did you leave?
14:41