#ayahne

When he heard the words, Yuuri choked, needing a rough hand pounding against his back before he’s anywhere near willing to attempt breathing again. Once he’s upright and able to breathe, though, he blinked blearily at the blond standing beside him, clearly waiting for a response.

“Come again?” he asked weakly.

Ed sighed, sounding about as irate as he always did, brain moving roughly 100mph faster than the rest of them mere mortals as Phichit always put it. But he sounded patient when he answered, somehow. Maybe just a little bit awkward.

“I said, teach me to fight.”

Yuuri blinked again, and cleared his throat uncomfortably.

“Ah. That’s what I thought.”

Ed stared up at him with raised brows, clearly waiting, and Yuuri tried his level best not to let loose the hysterical laughter clawing at his lungs.

Then again-

“I don’t know how to break this to you, but…”

Ed twitched, and groaned, reaching out to slam his fist against Yuuri’s shoulder. It’s enough to make him duck away with a yelp, because that had been the other man’s automail fist damnit, but it’s impossible to not give in to the urge to snicker to himself. Because there was a blush high on Ed’s cheekbones and it was hilarious.

“No, but really Ed. I’d have thought Izumi-san taught you all you could possibly want to know about fighting. And if you wanted to learn more… I’m not exactly the right person to talk to, y’know?” he murmured a whole lot later, once they were done chasing each other about.

He was supposed to be practicing for the ice show Celestino had him signed up to perform at. He barely had a week left, and he could really use all the time on the ice he could get. But… Something in Ed’s voice had told him that this was important.

Ed had been there for him when he’d first joined at Wayne State. And before Phichit had shown up and become his roommate and brother in all but blood, well… the alchemy prodigy had had a lot of practice in ignoring the shit other people spouted on a daily basis. He’d been something of a beacon for Yuuri, burning so much brighter than everyone else, brighter than anything Yuuri could dream of being himself. And yet with enough strength set into his very bones to carry him through not only his own problems but also carry Yuuri through his. His early unease, still unused to the place he’d found himself in, let alone the people he’d been forced to interact with. And his fear of never being good enough to get recognized in the senior circuit, let alone good enough to stand on the same ice as Victor Nikiforov.

Ed had stuck around for all of that, cursing a blue streak and somehow dragging Yuuri forward to walk on his own two feet, not giving him the chance to fall into a pit of despair, as he usually did.

So the least he could do was listen, right? Right.

“I said teach me to fight, dumb ass, but I sure as fuck didn’t say to do it with your fists. Christ, you can be such a pain, sometimes-” more grumbling that faded to something inaudible. Yuuri waited patiently, a faint smile pasted on his mouth. Because Ed was just as much of a pain, damnit.

“I want to fight the way you do, too. That’s what this entire flying-around-on -the-ice-with-knives-stuck-to-your-feet shit is about, right? It’s fighting without actually needing to rough anyone else up and without being an asshole. You’re fighting yourself to be someone better.”

Yuuri blinked at him owlishly. Ed stared back with a feverish glint in his eyes.

“Well, I wouldn’t go off on quite as much of a philosophical slant-”

“Shut up. You’re a self-flagellating idiot. You’re also a badass whether you like it or not. Now will you fucking teach me to fight with those fucking knife shoes on the ice or not?”

Yuuri couldn’t help himself. He just had to crack a grin at that one.

“So all that was you begging me to teach you to skate? You could have just asked, Ed. It would have been easier, anyway.”

Ed blinked back at him, before his lips split in the wide, hungry grin bordering on a snarl that had most people turning tail and running when they caught sight of it on his face. No one wanted to be on the wrong side of that grin.

“Glasses-bastard,” he said casually, “you’ve got to be the worst pain in my ass the side of town.”

“Yeah? I thought that was Phichit and extra spicy Tom Yum Goong.”

Ed went momentarily green, at least until Yuuri gave into the laughter again.

He didn’t think he’d ever laughed this much, before. Not outside of skating Victor’s programs with Yuuko. Never with a friend. Never with two wonderful friends.

“Sure, I’ll teach you. But I’m warning you, I’m a much harder taskmaster out on the ice than I am when it comes to economics.”

“Okay, okay. So that means you’re teaching me, right? Awesome. There’s this thing I saw on YouTube called a Bonaly-”

“Maybe we can start with teaching you how to balance on ice first-”

They spent the rest of Yuuri’s practice time arguing with each other. Yuuri couldn’t find it in himself to feel bad about it. Especially not when Phichit showed up after his classes to drag them both out to dinner.

*

It was barely a month later, and Ed was sitting by the bedside of what’s got to be the best friend he’s ever made, bar none except for Phichit and maybe Lan Fan, caught between relief that he didn’t lose Yuuri, and outrage that he couldn’t just get into his fucking car and go track down the bastard that had rammed into Celestino’s SUV on the interstate.

Yuuri looked tired, staring out the window with a blank look on his face, the surgery prepping his shoulder and rib cage for an automail arm looking stark in a way Ed didn’t think his own ports ever had. Then again, that was his own skin. The fallout of his own fuck ups. His pain was his own, he wouldn’t want to wish it on anyone else, let alone Yuuri.

For the first time in a really long fucking time, he had no idea about what the fuck he should be saying. People didn’t call Ed because they needed someone polite, after all. They usually called him when they needed to get shit done. Except he didn’t want to be blunt or brusque this time. Not yet. Not when they didn’t even know whether Yuuri would be able to skate professionally ever again.

“Hey Ed,” he mumbled, voice distant. It made Ed sit up immediately, craning closer to hear better.

“Teach me to fight,” he said, and the words made Ed’s throat close up tight. Yuuri turned around to look at him, his expression as blank as before, but his eyes looked so much sharper than they had over the last few weeks.

“Teach me to fight like you. I think I’m going to need it.”

“You crazy, glasses-bastard?” Ed choked out. “You can’t even get out of your bloody bed on your own and you want me to teach you to fight?”

“Well. Yeah. You’ll probably need to help me stumble my way over to my physical therapy sessions first, but after that-”

Ed broke into wet laughter, reaching out shove at Yuuri, because what else was he supposed to do, anyway. Gently, though. As gently as he was capable of, like dealing with a baby or a kitten or-

Yuuri gently swayed with the motion, his eyes crinkling up in a smile, even if he kept up that shitty blank expression on the rest of his face. Ed offered him a wild grin, holding up a fist to bump.

“We’re gonna do this. I’ll teach you to move again, and they you can get back to teaching me how to fly.”