“No, no, no,” your traditional dance teacher grabbed your arm, catching you off guard. The girls around you stopped their hand movements and looked to take in the rare sight of you being scolded. You clasped your hands in front of you as the teacher took your fans from you rather aggressively. She pointed to the side of the classroom with one of the fans.

Wordlessly, you walked in that direction, already knowing what to do after seeing the disciplinary actions of this teacher. This is the first time you’re experiencing it for yourself and to be honest, you were a little irritated with the way the other girls in your class were gawking at you. You saw one girl in particular smirk at you.

The teacher suddenly flipped open the fans and all of the girls’ heads snapped forward but they already missed the first two beats of the song. The music was cut abruptly and you only looked on from the side as the teacher walked to the front of the class. “You are all disappointing me right now.” Each girl shuffled nervously under her glare and she suddenly looked in your direction. You lowered your head and felt the glare burning right through you.

When you had the courage to look up, she was silently looking over another girl. She spent seconds weathering down each of the other girls and it added up to five minutes. All of the girls stood in the silent dance studio while the elderly teacher remained standing at the front of the room. You could hear whenever someone move but you noticed the way the teacher stoically kept her stance. Another five minutes passed of the loud silence before she spoke, “Join the rest of your dancers now.”

You quickly cleared your throat and answered her while nodding your head. You quickly went back to your spot in the back.

The music started and everyone started in unison but you danced without the fans as the teacher never gave them back to you. Your hands felt especially empty as you mimicked the hand movements of the other girls. Without the slight weight of the fans in your hands, you noticed the slight difference of the way your arms were supported when the part of the dance where you had to raise your arms into an arch.

Although this class was usually quiet, especially with this dance instructor, but the silence now was unbearable now. The music would randomly restart and you all had no choice but to go back to the beginning of the song and start over. You felt particularly vulnerable with the absence of your own fans which stayed with the elderly lady throughout the rest of the class.

The bell went off but you were all still in the middle of the song and none of you made the move to leave without the proper dismissal from your teacher. The warning bell went off next just as the song came to an end.

Your teacher had been circling the room throughout the dance and when she walked by you, she held out your fans. You took them from her with a bow and she moved to the front of the room. She gestured to her assistant who moved across the room to her. The two women conversed quietly before the assistant then turned to you all, “Let’s go, I’ll take you all to your next class and excuse your tardiness to your next teacher.” The final warning bell went off at the end of her words.

You all bowed to your teacher before quickly gathering your things and followed the assistant out of the classroom.

Once all of you were out, the assistant counted you all, “Which class do you have?”

“Almost all of us either have jazz or contemporary,” one of the girls at the back of the group answered. You kept silent, still affected by what happened in class.

“Us two have a free period,” one of two girls gestured to the both of them.

The assistant nodded, “Anyone else?” When no one said anything, she nodded again and started heading down the hall to one of the classes near the staircase. It was the contemporary class and she knocked on the door before entering. You slid your gym bag higher up your shoulder as the assistant did her apologies for interrupting the class and for your class’s late appearance.

“I was wondering where most of my class was,” the teacher brushed off the apology good-naturedly. She appeared at the door, “Those in my class, please come in and start stretching.” You followed five other girls into the class quickly and walked across the room to put your bag down and take a swig of your water. The girls that were already in the class eye openly stared at those of you who just now entered.

When you sat down and began stretching, one of them leaned toward you, “Why are you guys late?”

You looked at her before lowering your head, “We were scolded by Teacher Park, the traditional dance teacher.”

The girl widened her eyes and exclaimed, “So she’s in a bad mood?” she didn’t wait for you to answer as she continued on, “Yah, I have her for my next class. What if she’s still in a bad mood?”

You were about to apologize when Jooae sat next to you, “You can blame this girl here,” she nodded to you and the girl’s eyes narrowed at you.

You lowered your head again, “It’s true.”

The girl sighed before she shrugged, “Whatever.” She scooted away from you and Jooae and went back to her friends, no doubt relaying the information she just learned. You and Jooae resumed stretching in silence and you couldn’t get rid of the feeling of absence in your hands.

The teacher for this class clapped her hands to get everyone’s attention, “Line up so we can go over the bridge of the next piece of choreography.”  You quickly stood up and moved to your familiar spot in the room, thankful for the upcoming distraction from your troubled feelings.

As your instructor moved through the motions of the dance, you paid utmost attention and you ended up getting the moves down faster than the rest of your class. You didn’t want to get into trouble again by a teacher so you did your best.

Near the end of the class, as you all started putting the bits and pieces of the choreography that you learned up until now together, you were really getting into it. When the teacher called the class to attention, you were disappointed that you didn’t have more time to relieve the negative feelings you had been building up since your last class.

The bell went off and Jooae walked with you to the next class you two had. Since you two were in the traditional dancing program, you had just about all of your dancing classes together so there was little choice between becoming friends or being stuck in an awkward meeting. Neither of you talked very much as you both supplied your rivalry with one another aplenty.

You danced the remaining frustration out of you in your last class for the day. What was a nice surprise was to find your two friends out on the staircase waiting for you. At that sight, the last of you pent up feelings disappeared completely. You bid Jooae a polite goodbye and she did the same before you took off to Yoora and Hwami.

“Guess what Jejudo!” Yoora was doing her best to contain her excitement which was impossible so she was bouncing up and down.

You smiled at her, “What Yoora?”

“I have a boyfriend!” She pulled you into a hug.

You kept your smile on but you didn’t know how to react, “Congratulations?”

“Thank you! He’s so tall and you’ll like him when you meet him!” a look passed over her face, “I mean you won’t like him like him but you’ll still like him.” You watched as her enthusiasm was replaced with a confused expression on her face. Seeing the progress of her changed feeling was enough proof for you to see h