Yuri shakes his head. 'He doesn't have a passport,' he says. 'Not the kind we need to travel abroad, that is. And it costs a lot to travel, anyway, with the visas and the tickets and everything.' Especially when the state pension buys less and less every year, and the bills are always higher in the winter, when the skating season really hits its stride. And even if the skating federation had been willing to foot the bill, how could he leave his grandfather alone, with his bad back and his poor English, in a strange city for hours on end? 'Even for our Nationals, whether they're in Saransk or Sochi or wherever, I wouldn't expect him to try to come for them. That was why Rostelecom....'

The thought slows to a stop, landing with the equivalent of a soft thud between them. Katsudon knows this already. Some of it. Enough of it. There's no point in rehashing all the familiar reasons why the cheers that skaters tend to care about most have so often been silent ones. Besides, one of these days he'll have made enough of a name for himself that the money won't even be a factor anymore if he wants to pay for that extra hotel room in Saransk or Sochi. Buy the plane tickets. Cover the meals. Maybe even hire a car service so his grandfather can relax comfortably at the hotel for as long as he wants until the skating starts.

It'll happen, because he'll make it happen.

'Anyway, whatever, it's fine.' It isn't fine, of course, but it is what it is. 'I'll mention it to him.' He's got his next bite of noodles all geared up and ready to consume, but pauses before he can lift them from the bowl. 'Are your parents coming?'

(You know, if Katsudon had had someone else there in Moscow, his unhelpful brain cheerfully informs him, with uncharacteristic logic, he wouldn't have needed you to drag him to this place at all.)