The Depth of Green

Chapter 6

Chapter 5 recap: BABY BABY BABY-- otherwise, Otabek and Yuri's relationship improves incrementally, I stumble through the murky realms of metaphysical realism via Yuri, and his food is taken by an omega from the first rank. Mila gets dumped and cries on Yuri's shoulder, Yuri allowing her to pretend Otabek likes him because she's sad, even though, obviously, that is not true. XD

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Yuri woke, for the first time at this house, to a view of a world in white. It was the first thing he noticed as he gained consciousness, the blanket of snow covering the outside world. Shivering, Yuri ventured slightly further out of his blanket nest to get a better look at the world beyond the house walls, his pinkened nose and cheeks coming into view from beyond the edge of the sheet. The sight of the snow was interesting to Yuri, and jarring if anything ever was; on the one hand, the snow brought with it the cold necessary for its precipitation, which Yuri already hated; but on the other... it was snow.

Now, Yuri was no stranger to cold climates: he was from fucking Moscow; and he was far from susceptible to the allure of solidified water, but the first snowfall of the season, viewed early in the morning while the dusting of powder was still ethereal and unmarred, had always been magical to him. And, after such a long drought of anything familiar, anything he knew or was so accustomed to that he found it remotely safe, the sight of the snow was comforting. It was a quiet promise that all those bright, winter mornings where he and his grandfather had had snowball fights were real, and not just figments of his lonely, deprived mind, created to keep him company when no one else could.

It was with these memories at the forefront of his mind that Yuri dressed, pulling on his yukata and geta and drifting down the seemingly-endless, drafty stairs with images of ill-afforded hot-cocoa and chocolate-mustaches as his guardians. Yuri was just reliving a particularly bright, chilly morning with his grandfather when he'd come home from university for the holidays (the two had played endless rounds of Scrabble and Yuri had been put to work making endless batches of cookies because he was Too Thin™), when he entered the kitchen. Mila, always awake before him and currently standing facing the stove, looked up as he approached, face flushed pink and eyes shining. Evidently, she loved the snow, too.

Despite the draft wafting in from the flaked putty surrounding the window pane, that morning's breakfast prep was more enjoyable than Yuri could ever remember it being, which was not to say that he didn't like it, normally, for he did: it was one of his few chances to be himself, and, as much as he may bemoan her extroversion, he really did care for Mila; but they had never before spent their time together reminiscing over ridiculous anecdotes of Christmas time, standing far closer to the ovens than was necessary (and probably safe), and having pretend snowball fights with the dough they were supposed to be molding into adequate breakfast food. It was at the end of the merrimaking, though, that their little denial-bubble popped, and Mila mentioned, offhandedly, evidently assuming that Yuri was aware of what she was talking about, whether or not the "babies" would be promising, this season.

In actuality, Yuri had no idea what Mila was referring to, and, after a quick glance at his abdomen and a resulting head shake (there was no way she meant Yuri's, and besides, he was pretty sure that it was only one, and not multiple) he interrupted her, demanding an explanation in the form of a "What?"

Mila blinked. "The babies?" A nod. "Oh," her eyes widened, "do you not know about those? I thought they had them in Russia, too."

"What the hell are you talking about, baba?" Yuri asked, raising an eyebrow. "Yes, we have infants in Russia; we don't import them, you know."

Mila rolled her eyes, tossing her auburn curls. "No, not literal babies!" She looked at Yuri as if he were ridiculous; Yuri was less than amused. "We just call them that; I mean new omegas. You know, to," she pursed her lips, air quoting her next words, "'replenish the stock' before the mating season starts up again?"