O Fortune

Eleven for Health

The season wore on, and it wore Otabek down.

The cloak of his mood didn't weigh as heavily on his shoulders as it had before - if Otabek had been underwater since the end of January, then last year he was six feet under the earth and digging himself deeper.

Otabek held that thought close to himself as he swam.

Another difference: sometimes, he could keep his head above the water.

"Beka, you look like you got hit by a truck," Yuri commented when the Skype call connected.

"Hello to you too, Yura." Otabek tugged his fingers through his hair and didn't bother to force a smile, but this time it was because he knew Yuri would understand without an exaggerated pantomime of emotion. "I'm trying a new look," he continued with a yawn.

"I think we should all hibernate through winter," grumbled Yuri. "My hair freezes. My sweaty hair. Through my hat. Oh, you have a March birthday, people say. A spring birthday. Must be nice and warm, they say. Fuck you, I'm Russian. We don't have spring, we have second winter and it's not even spring yet, so go stick a cactus up your ass."

Otabek smirked. "Is that your way of asking about your birthday present? Told you, I'll give it to you at Worlds."

"No, it was me being mad about sweat icicles."

"Okay."

Yuri began to fidget, and Otabek waited.

"Just a hint," he whined. "My birthday was last week!"

"Hmm, I guess that's fair," Otabek acquiesced. The retro-style polaroid camera was safely hidden in his locker at the rink - he didn't trust Yuri not to call Gulshat and bribe her into searching for it. "It's kinda small."

"Beka, I fucking swear-"

"It's green."

Yuri growled.

"It's prickly."

"Are you..." Yuri blinked. "A cactus?"

"You got me," Otabek said, and silently begged his eyebrows not to do whatever it was that gave him away. "I thought you might like to have one, since you seem to have a thing about cacti. And, you know, orifices. But your present, your business, whatever."

"Oh my god, Beka, you can shove-"

"Yura, I wouldn't do that with your birthday present. Who do you think I am?" He sighed. "Besides, that's your fetish."

Yuri buried his face in his hands and screamed.

:: :: ::

Though Otabek is left to stare up at the podium when the World Championships conclude, he doesn't look down on himself. He'd skated well enough to ignite a candlewick of pride, and the taste of near-victory was gasoline splashed onto the flame.

For a brief moment, Otabek met Yuri's gaze through the crush of cameras, bodies, and emotion that filled the lobby they'd been ushered into. He tapped his chest, a mirror of the point at which Yuri's silver medal rested as it hung from his neck, and smirked.

Next time, Yura.

Yuri grinned back at him, all flashing eyes and bared ambition, and mouthed come and get it before he was whisked away by his coach.

JJ offered a stiff handshake by way of congratulations, and Otabek wondered what the price of their friendship had been, what had finally toppled its wobbling orbit. Maybe it was the tiny but vital gap between their results, or the pressure of Otabek's teeth sinking into his lip and choking his shout of bonne chance into a strangled whisper. It would have been an empty wish. Otabek was no longer his lucky charm.