Yuuri knows from experience that Viktor is just a regular guy. One that managed to win five consecutive golds, set new world records, and flip the skating world and its expectation of what constitutes a reasonable routine on its head, but still.
Even so, after half a decade of marriage and learning to help each other though the less glamorous aspects of being a human navigating the world—it sneaks up on Yuuri, sometimes: the realization of ‘holy shit this is Viktor Nikiforov™ my childhood idol.’
Thirty-year-old Yuuri is privy to things about Viktor’s life that fifteen-year-old Yuuri could’ve never dreamed. Intimate things that extend the trivia bullet points in the Figure Skate Life articles rotting in crumpled piles under his childhood bed. Like how Viktor’s snores sound like a bullfrog gargling marbles when he’s really sleep deprived or how he has very specific hair-related rituals involving mayonnaise and egg whites that Yuuri has a feeling have more to do with allaying his fears of his receding hairline than nourishing his follicles.
Yuuri’s star struck moments never seem to happen when he’d expect, like at the skating rink, watching Viktor transition from an effortless triple axel into a flying sit spin.
Instead, they tend to manifest when it’s just the two of them settling into the interstitial moments between the major plot points of their lives. One minute, Yuuri’s sprawled out on the couch—the laptop on his belly warming the sliver of skin his hiked up shirt reveals. The next, he’s being called over to the bathroom to hand his husband a roll of toilet paper through a crack in the door.
It’s a familiar routine—Viktor can never seem to remember that toilet paper is an integral part of the human waste to toilet exchange—but for whatever reason, this time Yuuri feels the need to text Phichit about it later.
(20:14) I can’t believe I just handed Viktor Nikiforov toilet paper through the door??? He didn’t even pull up his pants?????
(20: 15) You mean Viktor Nikiforov-Katsuki, the man you married five years ago and whose hand you held through a colonoscopy last Spring?
(20:15) ??? I mean I guess?????
It’s a joke at its core—their own personal meme.
‘Oh my god Viktor Nikiforov just took a dirty plate out of the sink and reused it???’
‘Viktor Nikiforov just asked me if I want to go get ice cream. It’s 4 am and I’m ??? ? ??’
There’s an aspect of truth to it, though. Yuuri’s come a long way with his anxiety and self-esteem since his Detroit days, but there remains a persistent, needling part of him that will never quite believe he’s worthy of the love he receives. It was hard enough to come to terms with his family’s affection, and their love is meant to be unconditional.
But despite what Yuuri might believe, Viktor’s not immune to it, either. It hits him unexpectedly, like when he’s chasing Yuuri around their apartment because “your toenails are talons, Yuuri, honestly why do you let them get so long? How is that even comfortable?”
Yuuri squeals and shields himself behind Makkachin, insisting that he’s the toenail Samson and if Viktor trims them, he’ll lose all of his powers.
“What powers?” Viktor folds his arms over his chest with a crooked smile.
“Toenail related ones,” Yuuri says, slapping the nail clippers out of Viktor’s grip.
Viktor stands there—watching Yuuri laugh all crinkle-eyed and rosy-cheeked—and he just wants to sit on the floor and cry because ‘holy shit this is The Boy Who Saved My Life™” and how did he ever get so lucky?
Star Struck
Published
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