[Wei Yong] Looking for Lilia

"Victor," I don't know how long he drove, his strength and anger were gradually exhausted, Yuuri said intermittently, "I-I'm so tired." Victor quickly cast a glance, and he quickly added: "I can't feel my hands anymore."

Viktor was silent for a moment, still looking hurt by Yuuri's words, but the corners of his mouth relaxed a little.

"Next rest stop." He said simply, as if driving took up all his energy, and he couldn't spare any time to deal with Yuuri, which is almost the truth, Yuuri thinks, Victor has always been cautious about driving.

They share about another six or seven minutes of silence before finally Yuuri cuts it off.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, "I—I was too much, I shouldn't—"

"There's nothing wrong with it," Victor said, "You have every reason to lose your temper with me." It didn't sound like a reconciliation, but as the jeep slowly pulled into the parking lot of the rest stop, he leaned over Uncuffing Yuuri's handcuffs was quick and gentle - he undid the handcuffs and squeezed the red wrists in his hands and rubbed them painfully.

He lowered his head, not looking at Yuuri.Yuuri can only see the tip of his nose sticking out from under his bangs—it's quietly red.

"It doesn't hurt—" he says in a panic, praying that Victor doesn't cry, and if Victor does, then—then Yuuri will probably do anything to make him stop, including giving in. "It really doesn't hurt, oh, Victor, don't—"

Victor sniffed, looked up, and smiled.

"Don't what?" He said, while continuing to knead Yuuri's wrist, which has gradually recovered from the numbness, and now it is pressed by Victor's soft fingertips, producing a hot touch that is different from before, and the temperature There was still a tendency to creep towards Yuuri's face, and he hastily pulled his hand away.Victor froze for a moment, the smile on his face froze again, but he quickly adjusted.

They sat quietly in the car for a while, each with their own thoughts, and there were cars passing in front of them, coming and going in and out of the parking lot, people getting out of the car, and going to the convenience store at the rest stop to buy supplies. Look, no one offered to get out of the car, and no one spoke.

Yuuri was going through a fierce internal struggle: part of him - a big part - desperately wanted to do something to make Viktor happy, but deep down a voice of reason warned: You can't talk to Viktor Nikiforov It's not healthy to get involved more - it's not good for Victor, and it's not good for you either.

How nice it would be if he lived in a perfect world, free from the persuasion of reason.

"So," Yuuri said, coughing softly, "what are you trying to do?"

He gave in, succumbed to his instinct to please Victor, and although he didn't want to admit it, he was already thinking "whatever Victor proposes, just play with him first".

Victor's eyes lit up.

"You're going to like this," he said, "We're going to find Lilia Baranovskaya!" He finished, looking at Yuuri with sparkling eyes, as if expecting Yuuri to say "That's great ! What are we waiting for?" Yuuri could only return with a dumbfounded look.

He thought—he thought he had traveled through time.For a moment, he thought that he was no longer a 23-year-old college student, but a 15-year-old teenager. One sentence: "We are going to find Lilya Baranovskaya!" This made him feel as if it was yesterday.

Victor looked at him, diamond-like anticipation in his eyes, as if he had made a particularly great proposal—and even that was exactly the same as before!If it wasn't for his hair—a well-groomed, bouffant bob—to remind Yuuri, he'd almost think he'd gone back in time for a split second.

"What—" he heard his own shocked voice, "what the fuck—what did you say?"

"I said, we're going to look for Lilya Baranovskaya." Viktor replied, "The party music must have made your ears hard last night dear, shall I say that again, we— Gonna-" Yuuri reached out and interrupted him from yelling in his ear.

"I heard it!" he said, his body already moving subconsciously, and he began to fumble for the doorknob behind him, "You're crazy, I'm going to—"

But Victor was faster than him, and with a soft snap, all the doors were locked.Yuuri slammed on the car door angrily, turning his head to glare at Victor.

"Get me out of the car." He said coldly, "You get me out of the car or I swear—"

"Hit me?" Victor said calmly, and he now looked like the confident young professor again, rather than the young man with guilt that would drown him. "Scratch my face, scratch my hair, let me get I deserve it? Whatever you want, Yuuri, but don't even try to get out of the car."

Yuuri Katsuki is dumbfounded, and he finds that it often happens between them, the angrier he is, the calmer Viktor is, and the moment Viktor adopts that "whatever you want" attitude, he finds his anger melts away.

"Victor—" he thought he was about to cry, and he stretched out the man's name, like he did when he was a child when he wanted an extra bite of maltose—it was coquettish, he realized later, it was Acting like a baby, but he couldn't think of anything else at the time, Victor would take the easy way out, "Victor, what on earth do you want—"

"What do I want? As I said," Victor said, "I want the two of us to have some good times together, just like before."

"Can't we do this in the school cafe?" Yuuri asked desperately, "Drinking coffee and eating muffins? Just like a normal young man with his babysitter when he was a kid? N you You have to kidnap me, and then—" he waved his hands twice, "bringing up that—thing."

Victor watched him for a while.

"First of all," he says, "we're not just 'kids and babysitter', and it's okay if you don't admit it, but I know we were best friends. Let me finish," Yuuri seemed to disagree , he said quickly, "Secondly, I would also like to have a comfortable chat with you in the school cafe, but you refused - countless times, if I drive you back now, are you sure you will have a good chat with me , instead of hiding away immediately, blocking me and ignoring me again?"

"Absolutely—no." Yuuri said without confidence, "How could it be?" But he knew in his heart that Victor was right, seven months, seven months since the last time he and Victor had a conversation outside of lectures Months, during which he had been doing his best to ignore Victor's existence, he could do it again.

Victor smirked.Yuuri lowered his head in shame.

"Like I said," Victor began again, "I understand—but you have to keep in touch with me, you don't have to like me, but you can't exclude me from your life, or—or I I can't help you."

With the patient look on his face like he's teaching kindergarteners that one plus one equals two, Yuuri looks away.

"I don't need your help," he said, feeling like a complete asshole, but he knew it was necessary, he made the right choice, and sooner or later Victor would figure it out, "You can't— Can't you respect me just once?"

They were silent for a while again.

"I just—I thought it would make you happy," Victor whispered. "You've always liked Lilia and wanted to see her in person, didn't you? Remember how you always said how good she was Great, when I told you she used to be married to Yakov, you looked so—"

"God, how old was I then, 12?" Yuuri said, "every boy said something stupid when he was 12! Also, she—she's been gone for how many years, you said it yourself since you were six I haven't seen her since!" He began to feel tired, "Does this sound familiar to you? We've had this conversation before, remember?"

"It's vivid." Victor replied stiffly, "But we failed that time, didn't we? This time is different. Someone actually saw her and tweeted the picture. I think—"

"It has nothing to do with finding her, okay?" Yuuri yelled, "It's me, I don't want to go!" He looked at Viktor angrily, they looked at each other, Viktor said nothing.

They fell into the deposition again.After a while, Yuuri said, "I want to go to the bathroom. I still have the right to go to the bathroom, I suppose?"

Just like Viktor knows that if he shows weakness, Yuuri will have nothing to do with him, Yuuri is also very aware of his own strengths and Viktor's weaknesses: as long as he acts particularly asshole, Viktor can't help but admit defeat. Y because it's like reminding him—that Yuuri who would never talk back to him, never go against his will, is forever in the past.No matter what Viktor tried to make amends, that Yuuri wasn't coming back.

Sure enough, Victor relented.

"Of course you can go," he said, "I'll go with you."

"Accompany me? Or spy on me?"

"With you," Victor replied, "you don't have to talk like that on purpose—you know? That's not like you at all."

"You know better than me what kind of person I am." Yuuri said sarcastically, but he agreed with Victor's words in his heart: hurting Victor on purpose also opened a big hole in his heart, and the damage caused would never be worse than Victor's. Arrived small. "Let me get out of the car, okay? Where can I go, it's on the highway."

Victor unlocked the door, but he followed him out of the car.Yuuri didn't stop him, but walked towards the bathroom on his weak legs, knowing that Victor was following him not too far behind.

They came to the bathroom one after the other, and to Yuuri's delight, the bathroom at the rest stop was as simple as he remembered, and the single room for one person was no different from the past, as if the torrent of time also took There was nothing he could do, and he closed the toilet door in Victor's face.Then, he took a quick look around the bathroom. Thankfully, there was a small window above the sink.

Without any more hesitation, he inserted the wooden pole of the mop into the doorknob of the bathroom entrance, so that the door could not be opened smoothly even with the key. The height is just right for him to open the window, but unfortunately the handle of the window is hard to push due to rust, which took him a lot of effort, but this is not a problem in front of an eager adult man, he quickly opened it The window, with the advantage of a flexible body, first the head and shoulders on one side, then the other side, and then the torso. When most of his body leaned out of the window, he suddenly found a point of force on the wall on the other side. None, which meant that when he leaned out of the window with his whole body, he had to fall heavily on the ground-even he recognized it.He tried to let his center of gravity slowly move down against the wall, and at the same time move his legs out of the window a little bit, so that when he fell, his hands could use the momentum to cushion-and he succeeded.Although he felt his entire arm go numb the moment his hands were on the ground, his legs drew a smooth arc in the air, his waist bent flexibly, and a perfect lower back——then his legs Taking over the center of gravity, he stood up.

——It's really choking.He stood up, his arm was still numb to death, he felt that his arm was pulled inward by the impact, but he quickly got up, all he needed was a public phone.

He quickly found one next to the restaurant. It was rusty but still usable. He quickly threw a few coins into it, and then dialed the phone number that came to mind the soonest.

After three fatally long beeps, the phone was picked up.

"—Hello?" asked the sleepy-eyed one, "Who—"

"Phichit, it's me," Yuuri said, "Listen, I need your help right now."