Icy Highness | Yuzuru Hanyu

21.

'Please come.' were the two words that she read on her phone in the morning that made her world shift perspectives.

She had given up on him and suddenly, the skater decides to give signs of life and on top of that, texts those two dreaded words. 

Athena didn't even know where he was, it could be Japan, Canada, or anywhere else. The worst is that she wanted to. She wanted to go and hug him, help him through this bad time, even if he had ignored her for such a long time.

'Where are you?' she ended up texting back against all of her morals and respect for her self-worth.

'Toronto.'

So he was in Canada after all.

Having him reply to her brought back all the giddiness and suddenly, it was as if they had never stopped talking. She just wanted to get more out of him.

'Are you ok?'

'No.'

'What can I do?'

'Come.'

The fact that she was actually considering taking everything off her schedule and flying to Toronto because of a man that ignored her for a whole month was just proof of the effect he had on her.

Athena didn't text anything back, but she did check her agenda for the next few days.

There were a few things that she was supposed to attend, but no official visits or engagements. It meant that she could, in theory, find a way out of them.

The real question was if she wanted to.

👑

On the other side of the ocean, Yuzuru was laying on his couch, like he had been in the past month with ice on his raised, injured foot and dwelling on the request he had made to the woman that occupied his thoughts.

The skater knew himself better than anyone and given the circumstances, he knew that having Athena in his life during the first weeks of recovery was a recipe for disaster.

It wasn't because of her, that woman was perfect in every sense of the word in his eyes, it was him that was the problem.

When he first decided to stop answering her, it was because he was mad. Mad at himself, at the ice, and at his skates. When Brian made him go through the detailed check-up on his leg, he knew what the results would be and didn't even hide it from his coach.

It wasn't a surprise when they told him just how severe it was, Yuzu had been expecting the dreaded day after all.

The prognosis wasn't great, especially not after he decided to skate on the already severe injury and he truly saw his whole career flashing before his eyes.

Suddenly, all the hopes of a second Olympic medal were gone. By the looks of it, he wouldn't make it to the next GP, let alone the Olympics in 2 years.

It was the reason why he distanced himself from Athena. Yuzuru knew better than anyone that he wasn't a nice person to be around whenever he was injured and this wasn't any regular injury.

His days were as boring as they get. He would stay on the couch playing games or watching his E-learning classes from university while his mom took care of everything, always with a look of pity on her face and he hated it.

Yuzuru felt like he was a burden but he also knew that if there were any hopes for him to skate again that he had to follow every single instruction from his medical team.

Physiotherapy hurt like hell and he was doing it 3 to 4 times a week while carefully being examined every few weeks.

He read every single text of Athena and he got back to them every so often. His goal was never to forget her, all Yuzuru wanted was to avoid hurting her with his words when he was so frustrated with himself.

It didn't surprise him when she stopped texting. He had given her every indication that he wasn't interested in speaking to her anymore, even if it hurt him every day.

The problem was that when she stopped, his mind kept lingering on her. He needed to know how she was feeling, how boring her royal duties were being, how she wanted to be in sweatpants the whole day, how much and what she had been drawing on the past days... Yuzuru needed her more than he had ever thought, but he couldn't hurt her. He couldn't be selfish.

Yuzuru had lost all possible hopes of ever hearing anything from her ever again. He had lost the most incredible woman he had ever met because he didn't want to hurt her. 

And when all the hope was gone, he came home from his Physio session to her text, the most unexpected of messages written on it.

'Hey, I hope you're ok... I miss you. Please talk to me...don't make me fly all the way there.'

A tiny bit of hope settled in him. It was unexpected how she decided to have one last try after not texting him for 2 weeks, but it was welcome nonetheless.

He couldn't be an idiot now, not when he thought that he had lost her so early and she was still there for him, not when he cared so much about the woman on the other side.

Yuzuru wanted her there, wanted her to hear all of his frustrations and help him through them. She had done it in the past, after Nationals. If it worked back then, maybe she was what he needed to get better, since nothing else seemed to work.

'Please come' he answered without any particular hopes, he knew what he was asking of her, how much he was asking.

Still, in his heart, there was this tiny spark of hope that she hadn't given up on him just yet.