Chapter Text
Mari Katsuki is twenty-five when she finds the rash on her breast.
It itched a little. Nothing alarming. Nothing she thought couldn’t be fixed with a tube of ointment and a week of cream. She went to the doctor expecting a minor inconvenience.
The biopsy came back as Stage III inflammatory breast cancer. Aggressive. Fast-moving. Unforgiving.
“You can’t tell Yuuri,” Mari said, her voice sharp but small, as if speaking too loudly might break something fragile. She said to her mother in the kitchen as Hiroko Katsuki set to work preparing her a cup of tea.
Hiroko froze, eyes wide. “Mari”
“I mean it. He doesn’t need to know how bad it is.”
Hiroko shook her head, whispering, “We can’t not tell him. What happens when we Skype and he sees you’ve lost all your hair, or… or when the treatment starts eating you up from the inside?”
Mari pressed her lips together, biting down the tremor she felt rising in her chest.
“Then we lie. We tell him it’s cancer, yes, but not how aggressive it is. Not that it could take me in months, not years. He’s only nineteen, and he’s so fragile- just starting college, moving up to the senior division, skating like the world is on fire already. He can’t handle the full truth, Okasan. It might break him.”
Hiroko’s hands, warm and steady, found Mari’s. She held them like a lifeline.
Mari’s eyes flicked to the sea. She watched the tide sweep in and out, thinking how life, like the waves, could carry you forward, pull you back, and change course so suddenly without warning.
Mari’s eyes flicked to the sea. Growing up next to it, the ocean had always been a constant, calming presence. She watched the tide sweep in and out, thinking how life, like the waves, could carry you forward, pull you back, and change course so suddenly without warning. And yet, some storms, some truths, could not be avoided.
Hiroko swallowed, silent for a long moment. Then she said softly, “The doctor said you have a chance if we start treatment soon.”
“Yes, but it’s still one of the worst, most aggressive forms of cancer. The survival rate for me to make it to five years is forty percent, and there’s no guarantee I’ll make it that long.”
“But there’s still a chance.”
“I know,” Mari said, voice firm despite the tremble under her ribs. “I’ll make you a deal. I’ll do the treatment, but only if you promise not to tell Yuuri what the doctors really told us.”
Hiroko nodded, relief flickering across her face. “He’ll see you fight, Mari. That’s enough for him.”
Mari let herself exhale, finally, letting the tension in her shoulders fall away.
“That’s the deal, then,” Mari said. “I do this for me. And I do this for him. But he doesn’t have to know the cost.”
She turned back to the window. The sea stretched endlessly. The tide would keep moving, whether she was ready or not. She had to be ready. For herself, and for Yuuri.
Yuuri Katsuki is 18 when he gets the single most devestating call of his life.
“I have cancer, Yuuri.” His sister tells him.
The words hit him like a punch to the chest. His hands tightened around the phone, breath catching in his throat.
“W-what…? M-Mari?” His voice trembled. “How…? I don’t understand.”
“It’s okay,” Mari said, voice calm in a way that only made his chest ache more. “I’m getting treatment. It’s… treatable.”
Yuuri’s mind tried to process, but failed. He thought of Mari lying in a hospital bed, machines beeping, hair falling out, eyes dimming. He had been chasing medals, podiums, and scores, thinking he could control his life. Now her life felt like sand slipping through his fingers.
" I should come home,” he blurted. “I should help. I can quit school and professional skating.”
“Yuuri,” Hiroko said softly when she picked up the phone on the second ring, “You will not abandon everything. You will disappoint Mari if you do. She wants you to skate. She wants you to live.”
Yuuri’s chest tightened. She was right. And yet, the image of Mari fighting alone, the sight of the town struggling to keep the onsen afloat without her the thought of leaving her to it gnawed at him.
The NHS would take care of her medically, he knew. But the onsen, the family, the livelihood. It fell on his ageing parents and Mari. Minako, their family friend and Yuuri's long time ballet instructor would be taking Mari to Tokyo for appointments. The Nishigoris would help with the Onsen where they could. Yuuri’s heart still twisted guilty even with their consent for him to stay, until a thought crossed his mind.
He swallowed, forcing a breath. “Then I’ll… I’ll make her proud,” he said. “I’ll win. podiums. Gold. Everything. I’ll do it for her.”
There was silence on the line. Then a frustrated sigh “Yuuri…”
“I’ll make you proud, Mari,” he repeated, louder, more determined with a strength he didn't even know he had. “I swear. I’ll make every second of this worth it.”
Hanging up, Yuuri collapsed into his dorm bed, phone still in his hand. He was shaking, but a fire had ignited in his chest full of desperation, love, and determination fused together. He will win because he has to now, and he will do it all in her honor.