It's 4:06 pm. Baekhyun stares at the clock hanging over the media station in the corner of the room. He's trained not to visibly notice when class is running late. They all are. But they all dare a glance at the clock longingly, side-eyeing their teacher-director as the woman pushes all the dancers in her charge. 

"Again!" she yells. "Just because it's late doesn't mean you can let your guard down! I want it full out. Now. What if this was a performance?! You're going to give it your less than best because it's late in the day and you're. tired?! One more time with the music. Or 10 more times until you all get it right! If you're lucky!" Dr. Jung* is harsh, but she has an otherwise sweet voice. The rage is only an illusion to bring out their best, and the company dancers know that. It's why they allow the petite 29 year old woman to abuse them day after day. 

The stereo skips to the beginning, and a dozen dancers swell with the music, a blur of arms and legs in a mass Baekhyun fondly calls ordered chaos. He's well trained in ballet (what professional dancer isn't at some point in his life) but that systematic albeit beautiful form of dance has never been his love. It's in a room like this, heavy beats and thundering, sweeping almost non-rhythms that Baekhyun feels alive. Modern dance in all its raw glory. Only in moments like this can Baekhyun let go of his stress, and feeling the music, let his emotions pour out. 

Sweat clings to his body. The warmth of the room produced by hours of hard working dancers leaves a cloying odor. Someone else might find it distasteful, but to Baekhyun it's the scent of home. The dance room has always been his home.

 "Kill me now." His friend and fellow dancer Tao flops onto the floor where Baekhyun lays already in a heap. It's 4:23 pm. Earlier than yesterday at least. "No wait don’t do that yet. I need food first."

"You always need food. Where does it even go?" Tao is tall and thin as a toothpick, and still manages to pack more muscle than Baekhyun will ever have. He's muscular too, of course, but it's of a leaner, softer variety. Baekhyun likes to think he looks delicate.  It's a cloak masking a deeper kind of strength, and all be wary if they try to mess with him. His old friend Chanyeol knows that better than most. Wiry frames dare not mess with the compact strength of the professional dancer.

“Casting parts go up in two hours. If you’re that desperate for food we should go now so we can be back in time.”

“Like it will even matter,” Tao grumbles.  He rolls dramatically onto his side, one leg kicked out and his arms spewed on either side of his body. “We’ll still be in the Core,” he says to the ceiling. “That bastard Suho will probably get one solo to lord it over us. And the current principals will still be the starring leads.”  

Life of a junior apprentice - lowest of the low in a professional company.

Baekhyun wouldn’t trade it for the world though. He’d quit college only two years in when he got his acceptance letter to the West River Contemporary dance troop. Once upon a time he was that small college town’s best dancer. Now he’s sweating it out at the bottom of the barrel, back in the big city, but the dream is that much closer.

 “So what? I have an invested interest in which principal gets which part.” The two peel themselves off the floor and head down the hallway while Baekhyun grins to himself. It isn’t exactly true, but Baekhyun loves seeing the two principals squabble back and forth over roles and stage time, throwing insults and the occasional punch, only to have one pass out drunk at the end of the day, while the other carries him home.

“You’re sick, Baek.”

The whole company knows of the apparent bromance between its two male principals. Luhan and Minseok had been at it for years with their deadly serious career rivalry. Yet they remain best friends.  

“The only reason Luhan doesn’t throw Minseok off a cliff and take his spotlight is because Minnie’s the only one dumb enough to carry Luhan’s drunk home. I tell you they’re fu—“

“I’m just saying I admire their… friendship,” says Baekhyun, his singsong tone hurriedly covering up Tao’s [possibly true] assumptions.  It is admirable though, he thinks, no matter what their relationship. But it’s something to give him pause about his own life. Will he and Tao be that way one day? Right now they are peons in the wings, but when it starts getting harder down the road, will they still be able to smile and carry on, friends forever? Audition season in the company is hell on earth. Will Baekhyun be promoted someday without Tao? Will Tao without Baekhyun?

“I need carbs. I need meat.” Tao has only one important train of thought right now. “And none of that disgusting street vender crap,” he waves his arms in the direction of the nearest street-facing window. “This part of town with the street food.”

“Quit your whining. I’m oh so sorry we’re not near your precious Chinatown.”

Tao snivels in complaint and Baekhyun copies it back twice as dramatically. With one arm slung around the taller’s shoulders, Baekhyun drags Tao down the hall.  It’s cooler on this side of the building.  More offices and fewer practice rooms.  More trees shading the eaves on east side of the facility.  Baekhyun halts to get a look at the still empty bulletin board atop of the staircase heading down. He knows it’s likely they’ll still only get Core, but you never know… Miracles could happen, right? Hell, he didn’t even need a real miracle. Just a little bit of grace. It wasn’t just his imagination that Professor Jung had praised him two days in a row, was it? She’d also praised Suho, but that was almost certainly because the jerk had a way of sweet talking the ladies. Baekhyun can sweet talk them too. He just, decides not to. Something about professional ethics, see? Nodding to himself, his imagination rioting with dreams of a solo stage (even 30 seconds would be enough!) he almost misses the shadowy figure slinking up in the dim lighting of the stairwell.

Tao and Baekhyun exchange knowing looks, and as if on cue they freeze on the steps and look back, just as the young man disappears down the hallway above them.

Tao’s mouth drops open, then closes. “Was that—?”

“Kai?”

“God, I haven’t seen him in…”

“Two years?”

“Something like that, yeah.”

“He’s like a ghost come back.”

“I thought he never comes here anymore.”

“That’s what I hear. That’s what I see anyways!”

“That’s what we don’t see anyways.”

“That’s who we don’t see anyways.”

“Whatever.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

“Shut up. I’m still freakin’ hungry.”

“Then shut up and let’s go eat already.”

 The chill, fall weather wind slaps at the boys as soon as they hit the door. Tao shivers in his short sleeves but still strides powerfully out into the wind. Baekhyun however freezes, literally. His clothes are still damp from the day’s sweat and it’s only going to get worse he knows.

“Hold up a sec. I forgot my hoodie.”

“You’re a wuss, Baek. And I’m not waiting for you.”

“Then let’s meet at the deli. Order me something fir—“

“I don’t want to eat at the deli. I want Thai food.”

“I thought you wanted meat and carbs?! Whatever. Just get me something to eat and I’ll be right there.” He anticipates Tao’s next complaint, “Just order me anything, Tao! Something hot at least!”

“Spicy hot or hot hot?”

Baekhyun doesn’t bother answering. He’s already running back up the stairs, hopping an extra step at the top and sprinting back into the practice room.  In the cubby holes by the old upright and dusty piano is his gray hoodie. Relief soaks into his body instantly. He’s still kind of freezing underneath but at least his arms and neck are now covered. He’s ready to deal with the weather again. And Tao.

His trek back down the hallway is less rushed this time. The building’s mostly cleared out now except for… Kai. Baekhyun gawks as the boy sneaks into one of the usually unoccupied practice rooms. It’s a smaller room with bad lighting, but there’s still a window opening on the upper part of the door and Baekhyun can’t resist it. He waits 20 seconds, 30 seconds, and when he’s sure no one else is going to come down the hallway, he steals a peak through the window.

Kai is a legend. A master of dance, and no dancer in the whole state region (and some nationally) could grow up not knowing his name. He’d won basically every competition there was to win between the ages of 7 and 16. His juniors were in awe of him, his peers were jealous; his seniors lived in fear of their being overtaken by the boy, and soon.

Baekhyun had seen him dance only once, when he was 15 and Kai 14. They were competing for once in the same division. He wanted to dislike the boy before he’d even seen him, just because of the buzz surrounding the legendary son of an already legendary dancer mother.  ‘You won’t win against him,’ his teachers said, ‘but try your best anyway.’ Baekhyun and his friends snuck into the balcony for the boy’s group performance, just to get a feel for his competition.  He remembers thinking the group was good, but can’t remember a single other person. Kai was good. Better than good. He was mesmerizing. He was the very definition of charisma plus artistry that every dancer strived to be.  Baekhyun felt sick, thinking about competing against that in a solo category. He blames that feeling for his less than stellar performance hours later. Kai won of course. Baekhyun came in third.

Of course this is all ancient history now. Their circles never collided again in the years that followed, though Kai’s reputation did not cease to shine through. Even now, pictures of the boy or article clips denoting his wins and performances lay encased in glass notice boards across the facility. His trophies line some of the office walls. Half of the plaques in the entryway belong to him and him alone.

Kai’s presence is all over the building, all throughout the company.

When Baekhyun was seventeen and seriously deciding whether or not to go for dance as a career, he applied to dozens of dance schools, companies and colleges all over the east coast. Maybe it was Kai’s reputation that influenced him just a teensy little bit to apply at West River Contemporary. The company’s pre-professional program was already phenomenal, and their professional company just beginning to make waves in the community.

He made it onto the waiting list, and for two years attended college in hopes of finally getting in, returning to audition every season. It wasn’t like he wanted to see Kai again, to dance with him, or to compete with him. He just wanted to dance with the best, and West River had the best.

Except when he got here, there was no Kai.

Rumors abounded. ‘He’s gone pro.’ ‘He was invited to study in Europe.’ ‘He gave up dance.’ ‘He’s studying engineering in California.’ ‘He and his mom got into a fight.’ ‘He changed his name and went to Russia.’ ‘I think he said he wanted to be an astronaut.’

Baekhyun shrugged off all rumors and put the boy out of his mind, mostly. Kai was nowhere to be seen, but Baekhyun now danced for the boy’s mom’s company. Part 1 of dream stage complete, and a guy’s just got to focus on his career.

Not now though. Not this exact moment. Not when the mysterious Kai has returned and right this moment he’s inside this dance practice room which Baekhyun just has to see!

He looks in.

There’s no music playing, only one overhead light, and Kai is standing in the middle of the room staring at his reflection. He’s not dancing at all. Just standing there. Baekhyun’s forehead crinkles in confusion. His body sways accidentally and his knee knocks against the door. Kai’s head looks up and through the mirror his eyes make contact with Baekhyun’s. The offender ducks and sprints down the stairs. He’s suddenly hungry for Thai food. He needs it right now.

2,121 words

Well, well, look at me here... My first fic with real ships. I'm a little scared. 

For some reason, this idea of a storyline came to me out of nowhere and all 12 characters jumped into my head fully formed (after about half an hour deliberating).

The dancer au is easy for me because I am/was a dancer. I love this kind of world and can't wait to experiment with it in this storyline.

Like I mentioned in the forward, Kaibaek isn't my main ship (It's about 5th in line) but my sister talks about it so much I feel like I can own it too. 

This is for her anyways... :)

Rosie

*P.S. I've loosely envisaged Professor Jung in this story as the actress So Yi Hyun, who played the dance teacher in Heartstrings, Jung Yoon Soo. See a picture of her here. 

  LiveJournal | Twitter | Tumblr