Viktor rubbed his eyes. “What the hell, Yakov, it’s too early for lecture. Did something happen?”
“Actually yes, follow me.” Yakov sounded strangely weary, no trace of the grumpiness Viktor had gotten used to. It set off an alarm in his head.
“Nobody died if that’s what worries you. Now please come with me.”
The teenager didn’t dare say anything else and followed the older man obediently into the living room, where Lilia was talking to a young woman. The first thing he noticed was that the unknown woman was holding a very small child, who was burying their face in the crook of her neck.
“Nice to meet you, Viktor, I’m Dominique Miller, case worker,” She introduced herself. “Sorry for coming so early but he really didn’t want to wait any longer,” She gently patted the child on the back. “Hey, look who’s here.”
The child, a boy, turned around and glared at them. As soon as his eyes fell on Viktor, however, he opened them wide and made grabby hands at him. Viktor immediately recognized the soft blonde hair and the green eyes he had seen mostly in video calls.
“Huh? What’s he doing here? What happened?”
Lilia sighed. “Vitya, Yuri’s going to live with us. We’ve known for some weeks, but since you had a big exam coming up we didn’t want to burden you: your grandfather talked to us and told us your mother can’t take care of him right now. We’ll tell you everything if you want, but in short, he said she called him one day in the middle of a breakdown.”
Dominique put Yuri down, who sprinted towards Viktor and threw his arms around him with impressive force for a toddler. His brain still struggling to process everything, Viktor instinctively hugged the boy back and held him close.
"He was at daycare when everything happened. He’s been down since and the only thing that cheered him up was the promise to take him to see you," The woman explained. "Viktor, your mother had a mental health crisis, but we have reasons to believe this had been building up for years. She's getting help now, but we talked and agreed that the best course of action was to remove Yuri from her care. Neither your grandfather nor his paternal grandfather can take him in right now, even if they promised to visit, so we're placing him together with you under Yakov and Lilia's custody. Being with his sibling was the next best option for him anyway."
"Oh, so… is this a temporary thing or…?” Viktor managed to utter after a few seconds that felt like hours.
"Viktor, we don’t know how things will unfold, but she's not taking him back anytime soon."
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Yakov let Viktor skip lecture and training that day. Yuri clung to him like a little monkey until Lilia managed to coax him into going for a snack with her. Once the teenager was alone in his room, all the memories and feelings he thought he had long buried came crashing on him like a huge wave. He grabbed his tablet and looked for a specific contact. His latest message hadn’t even been read.
>Hey, is everything okay? Grandpa said you had too much work but I’m still worried.
Something inside him snapped. He began typing furiously.
>Did you finally figure out motherhood wasn't for you? Too bad it took creating two whole human beings. Yuri’s okay though, we’ll be okay. In fact we don’t need you, I don’t know what you’re gonna do and I don’t care, work on your issues by yourself and don't talk to us ever again.
He tapped Send, not caring when or even if she'd actually read it, tossed the tablet aside and flopped down on the bed, draping his arm over his eyes. He heard Makkachin get up from his cushion and come closer, then the mattress dipped as he hopped on. Viktor remained still until a cool wet nose poked his cheek. A ragged sob welled from his throat. He turned on his side, hugged the dog and buried his face in his fur, crying his heart out.
Oh no they have mommy issues...
This year I'll try to work on my AUs for real, here's my second piece of writing from my YOI Space AU! Maybe I should've made more posts with background and context first but I really wanted to get this out of my system. I'll do my best to expand on this very self indulgent project in the following months but in the meantime feel free to ask questions :D
(Please don’t comment things like “I miss them”, “Fuck Mappa”, etc).
