Unspoken Definites

11 Changed

FOUR years had passed since that tragic event and lot of things had certainly changed in the life of Hanyu Yuzuru.

He did not give up skating despite all difficulties that came along with it. He signed up for ice shows to train himself. With a help of a fellow skater, he was able to train in Toronto, Canada. After that, he went on competing in the nationals and international competitions. He gained attention from the media. He became a source of inspiration for the people in Sendai City.

Eventually, he found balanced between school and skating. He was able to touch lives through his story. He was often interviewed in TV shows, he had endorsements and published his own autobiography. He won in different competitions, stood in the midst of the world podium, broke records in between, and snatched gold in the recent Olympics in Russia. True enough, he had come a long way from those hard miserable days of his youth.

Despite all the glitz and glory his skating life had brought him, that tragic day still haunted him at times when he was all alone. At random times, he would find himself thinking of that day. Somehow, no matter how much he ran away from it, it always found its way back to him. Often times, it would bring the sad and painful memories along with it. One of these was of hers... Of the painful memory of Kim Yuna.

Yuna whom he had never seen again. He had not heard about her since her family went back to Korea. Over these years, he tried to find her but it seemed like putting together a jigsaw puzzle with pieces so small that he did not know where to begin with. Kyoko had also lost communication with her. On top of these things, skating demanded so much time from him that even though he could already afford to go to Korea and find her himself, his busy schedule prevented him to do so.

So he woke up each day, schooled and trained but at the back of his mind were thoughts of her. Yuzuru went on chasing his dreams and he hoped along the way, that Yuna had not forgotten her promise to him because in a strange way, he seemed to not have forgotten of hers and of everything about her. Slowly, her memory became a painful one- so painful that when he thought of her at night after a long day, he would find himself in an impeccable abyss of longing.

But despite of that, he still hang by the hopes that someday, he would meet her again. The thought alone kept him going.

---

"Congratulations on winning gold on the Worlds Championship, Yuzuru." One of the reporters said as the press conference commenced. They were at the airport and Yuzuru had just landed back in Japan.

"Thank you," Yuzuru bowed politely and smiled shyly.

The reporter started asking questions about his recent accomplishment. He answered the questions with ease now and with eloquence only him could muster. He had gotten use to all these media attention but he made it sure that it did not reach his head. The interview did not last too long since they still had to roll up another interview with his fellow figure skater, Uno Shoma. As it drew to a close, Yuzuru found himself being asked by a question that seemed to be out of his territory.

"What are your thoughts about the upcoming Asian Figure Skating Trophy?"

Asian Figure Skating Trophy would be the first competition of the new season.

"I... I don't know. I don't think about that yet." He chose his words carefully. His agent told him about this already. They had not released an official statement yet but he was set to skip the AFS that year to attend to his University duties and to heal a minor ankle injury he concurred after the World Championships.

"Did you know that they will hold it in Korea this year?" Another one mentioned.

The word Korea hang by his ear like the last song he listened to in the airplane. He stared at the reporter.