Fic (Figure Skating RPF) Blue Flower (Mao Asada/ Kim Yuna)
Blue Flower
Figure Skating RPS (Mao Asada/ Kim Yuna, PG)
Author's Notes: 1390 words. Everyone hooks up at Worlds. Roses to leksa who betaed.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction and is not intended to reflect on the personalities or behaviours of the persons mentioned within. Pure fantasy.
When Yuna won her first medal at Worlds, the press asked if she had a boyfriend. At the time, she thought it a strange question. Not just because she was 16, but because it was something she hadn’t prepared for. Much like her skating programs, her words to the press had been repeatedly practiced. She would mention her coach, her long hours of training, her family and all her supporters. She didn’t want to be dumbstruck, and she certainly didn’t want to seem ungracious. But a boyfriend hadn’t entered her mind.
Years later, they ask the same question. In Korea, in Canada, in Italy. When she is winning and when she’s not. It’s familiar, if not less strange. At least she’s ready now. Sometimes she pretends she doesn’t understand the question. Sometimes she just laughs.
If they cared to probe deeper, she would tell them this is how she spends her time: training, competing, performing, training. In the off season she does interviews, advertisements, photo shoots and charity work. More medals mean more work and more work means less time. In her rare private moments she thinks too much. She worries about what she’s eating, how little she’s sleeping, that ache in her ankle that won’t go away.
No one asks.
Sometimes she practices smiling in front of the mirror. It’s important to get it right.
To win, you make sacrifices. They told her that when she was 10, although it was something she understood from a much younger age, before she could phrase it. She looks around at the skaters gathered outside the arena in Torino for the women’s free skate small medal ceremony and knows some of them have relationships. She doesn’t know how.
The end of the season shows on the faces of the medal winners gathered at the side of the stage. They’ll stay up late tonight and they’ll sleep in tomorrow. For a while it will be wonderful but it will be over too fast. She feels a little giddy all the same. She made it. She got through. One more exhibition (she can do that in her sleep) and it’s the end of the season. It feels like anything could happen.
At her first World Championships, she heard an American girl say, “Everyone hooks up at Worlds.” Yuna didn’t know what she meant so she asked her coach.
“A little romance,” he said. “For one night.”
She knew what that meant. She’d seen it happen. She just didn’t know it had a name.
Figure skating looks pretty from afar. Up close, it’s sweat, tears and fleeting liaisons. Hooking up might not sound romantic but it must be convenient. Isn’t something better than nothing? Yuna understands the why, if not the how or with whom. It always seems like she’s in the dark about these things. It wasn’t so long ago she thought she was lucky to be in a sport filled with so many beautiful boys, and then she learned all the pretty ones were gay. They hook up at Worlds too. With each other.
Who would she hook up with? She looks down the line of medal winners, standing to the side of the stage, waiting for the speeches to end. They look bored, fidgeting with their hair and shifting their weight from one foot to the other. They’re ready to go home, medal or no medal.
There’s muffled giggling behind her, and she turns a little to see two small girls covering their mouths with their hands. They’re wearing skating outfits. Tiny and cute. A welcome distraction from the ceremony. Next to Yuna, Mao Asada is looking too, and their eyes lock briefly as they turn back. They smile at each other briefly. A shared moment. Not unusual. They’ve been standing next to each other for years. It’s become familiar.
Yuna knows a lot about Mao. She knows what Mao eats, what music she likes, what she does to relax, that she doesn’t have a boyfriend. Yuna has a whole team of people, from her coach to her manager, who tell her about her rival. It seems strangely intimate. Like they’re keeping an eye on her lover.
Yuna knows Mao had a difficult year. Tears and coaching dramas. A bad performance at the Rostelecom Cup. Yuna read about it, but she can also see it in Mao’s eyes. She doesn’t smile a lot, but when she does, it looks strained. Yuna knows that look. She’s practiced it in the mirror.
In Seoul, Johnny told Yuna to smile for the cameras. “We’ll never be this pretty again,” he said. She thought he was cynical for such a young man, but a year later she won gold in Vancouver and his words came back to haunt her. This is it. It will never be like this again.
Smile for the cameras. At least she’ll always have the photographs.
The speeches end and the girls are called on stage amidst loud applause. Mao smiles again and for a moment it lights up her whole face and she’s genuinely happy.
She’s got the biggest eyes Yuna’s ever seen. It was terrible to think of her crying.
The medals are awarded and they do more smiling for the cameras before being lead off stage, already putting the season behind them. They go back to standing at the side of the stage, waiting for the ceremony to end and for the ISU to release them. Yuna puts her hand in the pocket of her jacket and idly turns over the small package she finds in there. It takes a moment for her to realise that she doesn’t know what it is, and she pulls it out and inspects it, turns it over in her fingers. It’s a pressed carnation in cellophane. A fan gave it to her after the short program. It had an odd aspect to it, like it had been carved. She was fascinated enough to stuff it in her pocket, hoping to take a closer look when she could.
It’s the same colour as Mao’s dress in the free skate. They should have given it to her.
But what would they give Yuna then? Blue flowers?
The ceremony is over. The crowd applauds and music plays and suddenly everyone is moving. There are cameras and microphones, people talking and shouting, and someone calls her name but there are too many people to see through. She may as well be looking at a wall.
She turns around and she’s face to face with Mao, their noses barely inches from each other. Mao looks startled. Like Yuna, a little disorientated. It’s been such a long year. They can’t walk straight anymore.
There’s a moment where neither of them seems to know what to do and then, without thinking, Yuna holds out the carnation. “Please,” she says, nodding at the cellophane in her hand. She tries to think of the appropriate word. “It matches your dress.”
For a moment, Mao looks at the carnation like it’s green and crawling, but then her eyes light up and she laughs. “My dress,” she says, and she understands. She takes the carnation and turns it over in her hand. “It’s very pretty. But I don’t have anything to give you.”
“It’s okay,” Yuna says. “I want you to have it.”
Mao looks at the carnation and nods. “Thank you,” she says. And she leans forward to kiss Yuna on the cheek.
It’s light. But Mao lingers there a little longer than necessary and Yuna can feel Mao’s eyelashes against her cheek. It’s nothing really. No one will notice. No one except Yuna, and she feels them like they are burning.
Yuna doesn’t know what to say. She feels her heart in her throat, that moment before stepping on the ice. She has an overwhelming urge to take Mao’s hand and run.
She leans her head to the side, feels suddenly bold. She won the Olympics. She can do anything. “They say everyone hooks up at Worlds,” she says.
Mao smiles slowly, and Yuna can see a spark in Mao’s eye, something she only sees when Mao’s competing. “I’ve heard that too,” Mao says.
Yuna smiles too, and they stand there like that, grinning at each other, and for a moment there is nothing else in the world that matters.
End.
Figure Skating RPS (Mao Asada/ Kim Yuna, PG)
Author's Notes: 1390 words. Everyone hooks up at Worlds. Roses to leksa who betaed.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction and is not intended to reflect on the personalities or behaviours of the persons mentioned within. Pure fantasy.
When Yuna won her first medal at Worlds, the press asked if she had a boyfriend. At the time, she thought it a strange question. Not just because she was 16, but because it was something she hadn’t prepared for. Much like her skating programs, her words to the press had been repeatedly practiced. She would mention her coach, her long hours of training, her family and all her supporters. She didn’t want to be dumbstruck, and she certainly didn’t want to seem ungracious. But a boyfriend hadn’t entered her mind.
Years later, they ask the same question. In Korea, in Canada, in Italy. When she is winning and when she’s not. It’s familiar, if not less strange. At least she’s ready now. Sometimes she pretends she doesn’t understand the question. Sometimes she just laughs.
If they cared to probe deeper, she would tell them this is how she spends her time: training, competing, performing, training. In the off season she does interviews, advertisements, photo shoots and charity work. More medals mean more work and more work means less time. In her rare private moments she thinks too much. She worries about what she’s eating, how little she’s sleeping, that ache in her ankle that won’t go away.
No one asks.
Sometimes she practices smiling in front of the mirror. It’s important to get it right.
To win, you make sacrifices. They told her that when she was 10, although it was something she understood from a much younger age, before she could phrase it. She looks around at the skaters gathered outside the arena in Torino for the women’s free skate small medal ceremony and knows some of them have relationships. She doesn’t know how.
The end of the season shows on the faces of the medal winners gathered at the side of the stage. They’ll stay up late tonight and they’ll sleep in tomorrow. For a while it will be wonderful but it will be over too fast. She feels a little giddy all the same. She made it. She got through. One more exhibition (she can do that in her sleep) and it’s the end of the season. It feels like anything could happen.
At her first World Championships, she heard an American girl say, “Everyone hooks up at Worlds.” Yuna didn’t know what she meant so she asked her coach.
“A little romance,” he said. “For one night.”
She knew what that meant. She’d seen it happen. She just didn’t know it had a name.
Figure skating looks pretty from afar. Up close, it’s sweat, tears and fleeting liaisons. Hooking up might not sound romantic but it must be convenient. Isn’t something better than nothing? Yuna understands the why, if not the how or with whom. It always seems like she’s in the dark about these things. It wasn’t so long ago she thought she was lucky to be in a sport filled with so many beautiful boys, and then she learned all the pretty ones were gay. They hook up at Worlds too. With each other.
Who would she hook up with? She looks down the line of medal winners, standing to the side of the stage, waiting for the speeches to end. They look bored, fidgeting with their hair and shifting their weight from one foot to the other. They’re ready to go home, medal or no medal.
There’s muffled giggling behind her, and she turns a little to see two small girls covering their mouths with their hands. They’re wearing skating outfits. Tiny and cute. A welcome distraction from the ceremony. Next to Yuna, Mao Asada is looking too, and their eyes lock briefly as they turn back. They smile at each other briefly. A shared moment. Not unusual. They’ve been standing next to each other for years. It’s become familiar.
Yuna knows a lot about Mao. She knows what Mao eats, what music she likes, what she does to relax, that she doesn’t have a boyfriend. Yuna has a whole team of people, from her coach to her manager, who tell her about her rival. It seems strangely intimate. Like they’re keeping an eye on her lover.
Yuna knows Mao had a difficult year. Tears and coaching dramas. A bad performance at the Rostelecom Cup. Yuna read about it, but she can also see it in Mao’s eyes. She doesn’t smile a lot, but when she does, it looks strained. Yuna knows that look. She’s practiced it in the mirror.
In Seoul, Johnny told Yuna to smile for the cameras. “We’ll never be this pretty again,” he said. She thought he was cynical for such a young man, but a year later she won gold in Vancouver and his words came back to haunt her. This is it. It will never be like this again.
Smile for the cameras. At least she’ll always have the photographs.
The speeches end and the girls are called on stage amidst loud applause. Mao smiles again and for a moment it lights up her whole face and she’s genuinely happy.
She’s got the biggest eyes Yuna’s ever seen. It was terrible to think of her crying.
The medals are awarded and they do more smiling for the cameras before being lead off stage, already putting the season behind them. They go back to standing at the side of the stage, waiting for the ceremony to end and for the ISU to release them. Yuna puts her hand in the pocket of her jacket and idly turns over the small package she finds in there. It takes a moment for her to realise that she doesn’t know what it is, and she pulls it out and inspects it, turns it over in her fingers. It’s a pressed carnation in cellophane. A fan gave it to her after the short program. It had an odd aspect to it, like it had been carved. She was fascinated enough to stuff it in her pocket, hoping to take a closer look when she could.
It’s the same colour as Mao’s dress in the free skate. They should have given it to her.
But what would they give Yuna then? Blue flowers?
The ceremony is over. The crowd applauds and music plays and suddenly everyone is moving. There are cameras and microphones, people talking and shouting, and someone calls her name but there are too many people to see through. She may as well be looking at a wall.
She turns around and she’s face to face with Mao, their noses barely inches from each other. Mao looks startled. Like Yuna, a little disorientated. It’s been such a long year. They can’t walk straight anymore.
There’s a moment where neither of them seems to know what to do and then, without thinking, Yuna holds out the carnation. “Please,” she says, nodding at the cellophane in her hand. She tries to think of the appropriate word. “It matches your dress.”
For a moment, Mao looks at the carnation like it’s green and crawling, but then her eyes light up and she laughs. “My dress,” she says, and she understands. She takes the carnation and turns it over in her hand. “It’s very pretty. But I don’t have anything to give you.”
“It’s okay,” Yuna says. “I want you to have it.”
Mao looks at the carnation and nods. “Thank you,” she says. And she leans forward to kiss Yuna on the cheek.
It’s light. But Mao lingers there a little longer than necessary and Yuna can feel Mao’s eyelashes against her cheek. It’s nothing really. No one will notice. No one except Yuna, and she feels them like they are burning.
Yuna doesn’t know what to say. She feels her heart in her throat, that moment before stepping on the ice. She has an overwhelming urge to take Mao’s hand and run.
She leans her head to the side, feels suddenly bold. She won the Olympics. She can do anything. “They say everyone hooks up at Worlds,” she says.
Mao smiles slowly, and Yuna can see a spark in Mao’s eye, something she only sees when Mao’s competing. “I’ve heard that too,” Mao says.
Yuna smiles too, and they stand there like that, grinning at each other, and for a moment there is nothing else in the world that matters.
End.